


The Speed Distance Displacement

by April in Paris (April_in_Paris)



Category: Shamy - Fandom, The Big Bang Theory (TV)
Genre: Drama, F/M, Romance, Tension, Trains
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-30
Updated: 2017-08-23
Packaged: 2018-12-08 23:08:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 28,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11656596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/April_in_Paris/pseuds/April%20in%20Paris
Summary: If Sheldon leaves Los Angeles heading East on a train traveling 57 miles-per-hour and Amy leaves New York traveling West on a train going 46 miles-per-hour when and where will they meet? What if Sheldon had taken a train to get to Amy in the finale, instead of an airplane? And what will they discover about their relationship on the journey?Published simultaneously on fanfiction.net.





	1. Chapter 1

It turned out soap wasn't as unappetizing as his mother led him to believe for all those years. In reality, the only problem was that there wasn't enough of it.

Sheldon put his hand under the dispenser in the men's restroom, the one down the hall from his office, and squeezed the button with all his strength. All that effort resulted in was a single drop of the pink viscous liquid on his palm. He ran his hand under another stream of water and used the sudsy water to scrub his lips yet again. Since they weren't pursed together, some of the soap-laden water made its way into his mouth. He didn't recoil from the taste; rather, he welcomed it. If only the waxy, foul taste could scrub his memory clean, too.

He reached for a paper towel and dried the last of the water off his face, sticking his tongue out to scrub it. Then he braced his hands on the edge of the white sink and leaned forward, resting his forehead against the mirror.

"Hey, Cooper, what's up? Is your own floundering career making you sick?" Kripke's voice came from the doorway, and Sheldon squeezed his eyes shut. And then kept them shut once it became apparent that Kripke was using the urinal.

"Something horrible has happened," Sheldon muttered with a clenched jaw. Then he had an idea. His office was between Kripke's office and the restroom, and his coworker rarely missed the opportunity to stick his head in the door and make a snide comment on his way past. "Did you happen to notice if Dr. Nowitzki was still in my office when you went past?"

"The blonde chick?" Kripke asked. "Nah. It was empty."

Sheldon let out a long breath of relief. That was a blessing, but perhaps it would be best to stay in the men's restroom for the rest of the day, just in case. Or the rest of the week. Or until Amy returned. At the thought of her name, of her smiling face, Sheldon's stomach summersaulted and he thought he might actually get sick.

There was a flush and Kripke moved to the sink next to him. "That soap dispenser is empty," Sheldon volunteered, finally opening his eyes but not losing contact the mirror.

"Hey, what's up with you and Ramona anyway? I mean, are you getting a little something on the side while your girlfriend is away? I have to say, I didn't expect you to be such a player."

Pulling his head away with snap, Sheldon glared at Kripke as his nemesis dried his hands. "I am most certainly _not_ having anything on the side! Amy is the human equivalent of a nutritionally-balanced one pot meal!"

"Cool. I'm so gonna tap that, then. Thanks, bro." Kripke turned to leave and Sheldon called after him, "If you're going to tap her, then I should warn you that her maple syrup is rancid!"

The silence of an empty bathroom was all that met him. Sheldon's shoulders dropped as his hands fell to his side, dejected and lost. How did he miscalculate this situation so completely? How had he missed the clues all along, clues apparently so obvious that even Penny noticed them? And what should he do now? It really wasn't practical to hide in the restroom until Amy returned. And how would she come in and see him without breaking protocol?

He didn't want to wait. In those seconds that he sat frozen with Ramona's lips touching his, terrified and disgusted and confused, all he could think about was Amy. Everything about her. How her kisses, even from that very first kiss after they'd gone dancing that she didn't even remember, had never, ever hurt like the the kiss from which he'd been unable to break away. Kissing Amy was warm and loving and comforting and safe. Loving Amy made him feel safe. Loving Amy was everything.

His fingers brushed the side of his pants, and something about it reminded him of the time he'd carried her engagement ring - for it was no one else's now and never could be - in that pocket, full of hope and desperation, only to have his heart crushed under a lamppost. How was he to know then that being kissed by someone who wasn't your true love was just as devastating as watching it unfold?

The engagement ring. It had been sitting in his office drawer, mere inches away from him, as his lips had been sullied. Now that their apartment was so small, he didn't really have a good place to hide it from Amy. And his storage unit was for discarded, unwanted goods. There was nothing about his relationship with Amy he didn't want, nothing he wanted to discard.

But what if he just had? What if the ring, and all it stood for, was sullied now, too? A wave of nausea swept over him again, causing him to almost double over.

No. No! It wasn't like that. He knew it. Penny had known it. He had been taken advantage of, used against his will. Amy would understand, she always understood. She always made everything right again. All he needed to do was exactly what he instructed her to do: step away from the situation and call her immediately. And here he was, already several steps away and his phone was in his pants pocket. He grabbed it out and held it up to make the call but stopped before he placed his thumb on the button to unlock it.

This didn't seem like the sort of thing one should say over the phone, FaceTime or not. And he didn't want to. He wanted to tell Amy in person, to throw himself at her, to declare his undying love, to prove what his only wish for them was, for their lives together. He wanted to get down on one knee, as he should have done ages ago, and ask her to be his wife.

Because if he had already been her husband, none of this would have happened. The ring on his finger would have been a symbol to Ramona, to the whole world, that he was taken. His limited edition action figure-self had been procured and prized in a private collection.

Amy was in New Jersey and to New Jersey he would go. He used his phone to call a taxi cab instead, ran back to his office, and, by the time he got to the street, one was there waiting for him.

"Where to?" asked the driver as Sheldon buckled his seatbelt.

"Union Station, please, as quick as you can."

"Got a train to catch?" the driver queried.

"I've got a life to catch before it's too late."

* * *

"The most direct route would be to take the Southwest Chief to Chicago, and then take the Lake Shore Limited to New York. From there, you can catch a commuter train to Princeton," the Amtrak clerk at the desk explained, looking at her computer screen.

"Yes, I know. I have the entire Amtrak time table memorized. All I want to know is if I can get a ticket for the 6:10 train," Sheldon explained.

"Of course, there's still several seats left in coach."

"No, not coach," Sheldon protested firmly. "I don't share bathrooms. And I need a daily shower, I can't travel fifty-nine hours without one. I can't show up at my girlfriend's door smelling like fifty-nine hours worth of stale coach-class air and expect her to take me in."

"There is actually a changing and shower room on the lower level of each of our Superliner coach cars, sir."

"I know that! " Sheldon was getting exasperated. "I've memorized the schematics, too. I probably know more about your job than your supervisor's supervisor's supervisor." He took a deep breath. "I can't share a bathroom or a shower with that many people. And the last time I used the changing/shower room in coach, the door didn't lock properly and a hobo stole my pants."'

"A hobo?" she asked with an arched brow.

" _Yes_ , a hobo. What I need is a bedroom compartment. First class. I understand the costs associated," Sheldon tried speaking slower, just in case the clerk wasn't understanding him properly.

"Unfortunately, all the first class bedrooms are sold out for today's train. There is a still a first class roomette available -"

"Which doesn't have a private bathroom," he finished for her.

"Correct. So, if you want a private bathroom, you'll have to wait until tomorrow evening's train. There still a bedroom left on it, and I'd be happy to reserve it now for you."

"But you don't understand! I need to get to New Jersey as quickly as possible!"

"Then, sir, might I suggest you consider flying there." The agent blinked very slowly, her face blank, giving away nothing.

"I hate flying. Do you have any idea how many people share _that_ bathroom?" He shook his head. "The average cross-country aircraft has one bathroom for every 43 passengers, whereas even a coach class car on Amtrak has a much smaller ratio of one bathroom per every 10.1 passengers."

"I wasn't aware of that."

"You should be. Amtrak should put in on their advertisements." He paused and tried a different tactic. "I'm sorry I was rude earlier. I need to get to New Jersey to see my girlfriend. I miss her and I want to surprise her."

"Well," the clerk said, typing on her keyboard, "a passenger in a bedroom is detraining tomorrow morning in Winslow, Arizona. If you'd allow the car attendant a couple of hours to clean and redress the room, I suppose we could let you move into it at that time. But, I'm sorry, tonight your only option is a roomette on this route. We could look into the Coast Starlight up to Sacramento and you could take the Zypher from there, but I'm fairly certain that would add an additional day to your journey."

Sheldon rapidly reviewed the time tables in his head and agreed with her. "Fine. I'll take the roomette for tonight as long as you guarantee that I will have a bedroom compartment for the rest of the journey."

"Yes, it will be right here on your tickets. Would you like a receipt?"

"Absolutely. In case I have to prove what I paid for."

The agent tapped a few keys again and the sound of a ticket printer was heard. She reached down for them with one hand in the same motion she reached for her stapler in the other, attaching them all inside a paper envelope emblazoned with the Amtrak logo.

"Here you go, sir. Have a wonderful journey and nice a time in New Jersey. I'm sure your girlfriend will be, um, surprised to see you." She smiled at him.

"Oh, she will be. She has no idea I'm coming. I'm not going to tell her, either." He took his tickets and walked toward the first class lounge.

* * *

Amy wrapped the white bath robe tight around her waist and went to the sofa to call Sheldon. It had become their mutually agreed upon ritual that she would make the evening call before she went to bed. She had taken to calling it their Goodnight Call, but, as Sheldon was opposed to labeling their phone calls with exact or even approximate times of day due to the time difference, that was only silently in her head.

No sooner had she settled on the sofa than her phone rang, though.

"Hello, Penny," she said as she answered it.

"Oh, good! I caught you!"

"Why wouldn't you catch me? It's almost ten. Where else would I be?"

"The time change always confuses me. Listen, Leonard told me something you need to hear."

"As much as I love a juicy piece of gossip told in confidence, I was just about to call Sheldon. Call I call you back after I talk to him?"

"That's what I'm calling about."

Amy waited for her friend to continue but there was silence on the line. "Are you there?"

"Do you remember a couple of summers ago with Sheldon got that wild idea to ride around the country on a train?"

"Er, yes." Amy's brow furrowed, and that furrow only deepened as she heard the muffled sounds of Penny and who must have been Leonard whispering in the background.

"Okay, so, um, well, he got on a train again."

"What? But he didn't text me or anything!" It all came rushing back, how shocked and betrayed she felt when she discovered Sheldon had left her without saying good-bye, and then when she discovered that Leonard and Penny knew and didn't tell her in time, either.

More muffled whispers and then, clear enough to hear, "Well, I'm telling her anyway!"

"Amy, it's not like that again!" Penny's voice came back loud and strong. "I don't even know why I brought it up. Silly me! He told Leonard that he's going to New Jersey to see _you!_ That's good, right?"

Amy tried to ignore the tone in her best friend's voice that made her think that Penny was trying to convince herself of that. But, yes, if that was true, it seemed like a good thing. "So he came and told you guys about this? Why didn't he tell me?"

"Weeellllll, he didn't exactly come and tell us. Sheldon wasn't in his office when Leonard went to get him, so he stopped by Kripke's office and Kripke told Leonard that Sheldon was sick in the bathroom earlier -"

"He's sick and he's traveling?" Amy's heart sped up. What was going on?

"- and then Leonard realized he'd left work and he texted him, and Sheldon said he felt fine but there was something he had to do and it couldn't wait. He said he was at the station waiting to get on the train."

Amy reached for her laptop and pulled up Amtrak's website to study the most likely routes. "When was this? He hasn't said anything to me."

"Um, about an hour ago. About the time Leonard was leaving work, he was looking for Sheldon to drive him home."

"Did you go get him?"

"Leonard thought we shouldn't. He, um, said he's your problem now."

Amy frowned while scanning the website. "There's not a train straight from Los Angles to New York, but Amtrak's website recommends the most direct route as the Southwest Chief to Chicago and changing to the Lake Shore Limited there. And the next Southwest Chief leaves LA in -" she did some quick math "- fourteen minutes. I need to go, I should call him -"

"You can't!" Penny protested through the phone.

"What do you mean I can't?'

"He made Leonard promise we wouldn't tell you. He said he wanted it to be a surprise."

"But we Skype at least twice a day. How did he think I wouldn't notice? This all doesn't make any sense."

"Well, call him like normal and see what happens. Maybe he just wants to tell you himself. But don't tell him we told you. Besties before testes, right?"

"Yeah . . ." Amy said absentmindedly, staring at the suggested route map on the screen, still trying to piece together what had changed. What had unsettled her boyfriend so much that he suddenly decided to travel and keep secrets and possibly not seek treatment for an illness? She closed her eyes and swallowed away the face that floated up in her brain. Dr. Ramona Nowitski had changed things.

 _No. No,_ she chided herself. _Don't be silly. Sheldon loves you. Sheldon is racing across the country to see you. To surprise you. That has to be romantic, right?_ Right?

"Okay, maybe you're right. Let me call him and pretend I don't know. Thank you for letting me know."

"Goodnight, sweetie. Talk to you tomorrow?"

"Yes, of course. Goodnight."

Amy hung up with Penny at the same moment a text flashed on her screen. From Sheldon.

**I'm sorry, but I've come down with a case of laryngitis, so we can't talk tonight. I think I should take something and go straight to bed. I love you.**

* * *

Turning over, Amy lifted her head to punch in the pillow, trying to fluff it up to support her neck the way she liked. She should have brought her own pillow, this one wasn't firm enough for her. Putting her head back down, she frowned.

Had Sheldon lied to her? She couldn't wrap her mind around the possibility that he might have. On one hand, Kripke had said that he was sick earlier in the day. But then Leonard said that Sheldon told him he wasn't. Which was it? Was he lying to her or had he lied to Leonard? And what would his reason be for lying to either one of them? And since when did Sheldon lie?

She reached up and rubbed her eyes. No. Surely Leonard had just misunderstood him. But, then, if that was true, why was he traveling sick? And, there was no denying it, if Sheldon was on a train as she slept, then he _had_ lied to her at least via omission. While it was true that he could have laryngitis and it was true that he could be going to sleep on the train, he was hoping she would assume he was at home and was going to his own bed.

And then there was Dr. Nowitzki - no, she would not think the worst of the man she loved and trusted. He'd been very honest and open with her about Dr. Nowitzki. It was highly unlikely she had anything to do with this.

Right?

After rolling on her back, Amy sighed and sat up. _I love you_ , his text had said. That, at least, was true. She reached for her glasses and grimaced at the time displayed on the alarm clock. If she wasn't going to sleep, she should try to be productive. She got out of bed, put on her robe and slippers, and moved to the sofa again, opening her laptop. Amtrak's website was still on her screen, as she'd never closed the tab after talking to Penny earlier.

She studied the line on the screen, an uneven but smooth red streak across the nation. The path that Sheldon was taking. Amtrak estimated the entire journey would take fifty-nine hours plus the layover in Chicago between trains. Approximately three days before she would see him or perhaps even hear from him if he wasn't going to Skype because of his (possibility fictitious?) case of laryngitis. Three days before she'd get to the bottom of this whole situation, before she could question him in detail.

Clicking on the eastern end of the route line, Amy looked to see where exactly he would end up, and the Lake Shore Limited schedule and details filled her screen. Instantly she knew exactly what she was going to do.

* * *

It was only underground that one could see the former glory of Penn Station, the marble walls and the gold sconces. It was hot and too crowded, although there were signs up everywhere about the upcoming infrastructure renewal by Amtrak.

Pulling the suitcase Sheldon had bought her behind her, because it was the only one she had, Amy scanned for the correct track. There was a short line but it moved quickly. She gripped the handle of the luggage tighter and swallowed hard. The concerns she'd had on the commuter train that morning returned. She could still turn around, head back to Princeton, call Penny back and tell her she'd changed her mind, and be there when Sheldon arrived. She could act shocked to see him, and he'd be none the wiser.

But she couldn't wait. Something had happened involving Sheldon, something had sent him running away again, and she needed to know what. She stepped into the line. When it was her turn the Amtrak employee smiled at her and looked down at her ticket.

"Seat 12A in coach. Fifth car down." He waved with his arm toward the train. "And welcome aboard the Lake Shore Limited!"

_To be continued . . ._

* * *

**_All aboard! This one was not easy._ **

**_Regardless, thank you in advance for your reviews!_ **


	2. Chapter 2

The shower was almost as good as taking one at home. It was true that the toilet/shower stall combination didn't allow for much movement and the water only ran for two minutes at a time without pressing the button again and he had to wash his hair with the tiny complimentary bar of body soap because he hadn't packed any toiletries of his own - he hadn't packed anything at all and he'd been too confused and shocked to buy anything before he left Los Angeles - but the water was scalding hot and the train swayed reassuringly around him as Sheldon stood there, grasping the grab bar with his hand. He was on his way to see Amy and that was all that mattered.

The water dribbled away as yet another two-minute cycle finished. Sheldon wanted to press the button again, but he stopped, his hand in mid-air. Not only would wasting the hot water be unkind to his fellow passengers, but it would also backfire on him later in the journey. There was only so much fresh water a train could carry - 500 gallons per each Superliner sleeper car, to be exact.

Instead, Sheldon reached for a bath towel rolled up in the small shelf above the toilet, and thus out of the stream of water, and opened the door to dry himself in the relative larger space of his sleeping compartment proper. He was going to have to give the car attendant a very generous tip for getting the room ready for him so quickly. The previous night, he'd slept cramped in a roomette as the train left Los Angeles and headed east. The time was spent staring out the window, watching the landscape he saw every day slowly change and roll away, doubting his decision to send Amy that text the previous evening.

It was late morning somewhere in New Mexico, and sun and desert streaked past the window, which meant, of course, that it was early morning in New Jersey. By silent mutual consent, it had become his duty to initiate the morning Skype call with Amy. He finished dressing, desperately wishing he had some clean underpants, and he patted his hair smooth in the mirror above the sink.

His phone was just where he'd left it, on the middle on the blue bench. Sitting down between it and the window, Sheldon stared at it as though it would tell him how it should be used, what he should do now.

He didn't want to lie to Amy again. But then he also wasn't ready to talk to Amy yet, either. Yes, he could have flown to Princeton, but it wasn't just the ratio of passengers to airplane bathrooms that had factored into his decision to take the train. He needed time to think, time to clear his head. Well, as much as he could clear his head with his eidetic memory. He swallowed away the disgust and shame rising in his throat again, not just from the misleading text but from the feel of her lips -

Quickly, Sheldon stepped back into the tiny bathroom, lifting the lid on the vacuum toilet, his stomach threatening to bring his Amtrak Signature French Toast back up. But nothing came, despite his almost-wish that it would. Just like his wish that soap could wash it all away.

After Leonard called him last night, as he sat waiting for his train, he was terrified Amy would call, too, and ask him how his day had gone. But, of course, she expected him to still be at work. She wouldn't call until later as had become their habit.

Preemptively, if only by a few minutes, he lied to her.

He knew that he needed to talk to her, that he wanted to talk to her, that he wanted to do so much more than talk to her. He wanted to ask her to spend the rest of her life with him. Because, as dark and dank as those seconds when Ramona's lips had been touching his had been, they only brought into even sharper focus how bright and colorful the months of living with Amy had been.

Out of the bathroom again, he reached for his phone, glancing at the corner: only sixty percent of his battery left. At some point, that was going to become a serious problem. He didn't have a charger with him. He'd walked right out of CalTech without his bag. Fortunately, he'd charged his phone at work yesterday morning, so the battery was at full capacity when he slipped it in his pocket mere minutes before Ramona walked in. And talking to Amy on FaceTime would take -

Sheldon's head snapped up. He didn't have to lie anymore. Well, not technically. His fingers worked the keyboard.

**S: I'm so sorry, but I left my charging cable behind yesterday and I'm afraid I'll run out of power. We can't talk this morning.**

There was not a single untrue word in that message.

**A: How are you feeling?**

The questions shouldn't have surprised him, as it was in Amy's nature to worry about him when he was sick. She was probably upset she couldn't be with him, to make him soup and to sing Soft Kitty to him. Now that he thought about it, it was strange for her to have accepted his text excuse yesterday so peacefully. Normally, she would have called anyway, demanding to know his temperature and if he was drinking enough fluids.

**S: Better, thank you.**

Sheldon winced. He was lying again. He didn't feel any better than yesterday at all. He felt just as conflicted as he had in the bathroom at work. He thought deciding to make the journey would resolve everything, and it was true it gave him a sense of purpose and direction, but it led to even more complications than he had yesterday.

**A: I'm pleased.**

She didn't add anything else, and again Sheldon was struck by the oddity of that. Was she angry about last night? It wasn't like Amy to hide her anger from him.

**S: I love you.**

It was the most genuine and honest thing he could say. There was nothing about it that confused him or conflicted him, and just the act of thinking it, let alone typing it, lessened the discomfort he felt.

**A: I love you, too. Have a good day. Please take care of yourself.**

Squeezing his eyes shut, Sheldon blocked out Arizona. What was he doing?

* * *

What was she going to do? Amy lowered her phone with a frown. Sheldon was still lying to her, and now it seemed like he intended to do so until he arrived. What was he hoping to accomplish by that? She'd had an idea in the middle of the night, but once she got up this morning it seemed silly. Life was not a dream in which people ran toward each other in a meadow, their arms wide, and fell into a blissful embrace.

She studied the train car around her for a moment, surprised but pleased it wasn't very crowded, and then she dialed Penny's number. There was still time to change her mind.

"Hey, Amy!" her best friend answered.

"Hello." Amy stopped, unsure how to explain what increasingly seemed like a harebrained idea to her.

"What's up? Have you talked to Sheldon?"

She had to give Penny credit for getting straight to the point. "Um, sort of. Not really. As soon as I got off the phone with you last night, he texted and said - and said he was unable to speak then."

Now she was doing it to, lying via omission. Of course, this wasn't her soul mate she was speaking to, but it was a dear and trusted friend nonetheless.

"Are you going to try again?"

"Yes. Um, in a way. That's actually what I called about. I made a decision, but I'm not sure it's the right one." A man passed by her seat and Amy scrunched down into it and lowered her voice.

"Oh, what?"

"I'm a . . . on a train myself."

"What?!" Amy pulled the phone away from her ear sharply at Penny's outburst. "What do you mean? What train?"

"I'm on the commuter to New York."

"Oh, okay." Penny let out a breath. "So is it like a work thing? Or are you just going to sight see?"

The train slowed to a stop at the Newark Airport Terminal, and Amy could tell from the platform that her car was about to get more crowded and she'd lose some of her privacy. Not to mention that no one liked to travel with a chatterbox.

"Penny, do you know what a speed distance problem is?"

"I'm going to guess it's a problem involving speed and distance."

"Well, yes. It's an algebraic story problem, one of the most common as a matter of fact. I'm sure you've seen one. They're usually are something like 'if a train leaves Baltimore traveling eighty miles an hour and another leaves Atlanta traveling 62 miles an hour -'"

"Ugh!" Penny made a loud, unattractive gagging noise on the other end of the phone. "I hate those things! Who cares? It's not like anyone ever really needs to solve a problem like that in real life. When would you even need to know when two different trains from opposite directions are going to cross?"

"I do. Right now."

"Huh? You called me to talk about a math problem you need to solve? I thought you wanted advice about Sheldon."

Amy took a deep breath as the train hurdled her to New York City once again. The point of no return. "I'm taking a train from New York City west while Sheldon travels east. I've decided I'm going to meet Sheldon half-way. Or, well, in Chicago which is more east than exactly half-way, but since I'm starting a day later it will all work out."

"Oh! Okay. Cool?" Her voice was questioning and Amy knew why.

"Sheldon doesn't know."

"Oh, sweetie, please don't tell me this is a secret, too."

"No. Well, maybe. I want to tell Sheldon myself, so please don't tell Leonard or anyone else that might spill the beans before I get the chance." If Sheldon will ever talk to me instead of texting, she added silently.

"Can I tell Bernadette?"

"No!" Amy said sharply. The woman who had sat down in front of her swiveled her head back.

"Listen," Amy whispered in to the phone, "I have to go. I just wanted you to know where I was. Don't worry about me, about us. We'll be fine. People travel on trains all the time."

"Okay, but don't, um, take candy from strangers!"

"I won't. Goodbye."

"Bye, sweetie. Check in and let me how it's going, okay?"

"I will. But everything will be fine," she said with more conviction than she actually felt.

Penny rang off with a cheery goodbye, and Amy looked as the last of New Jersey shuttered past the window before the train dipped underground and darkness enclosed them.

"Next and final stop," came the voice over the loudspeaker, "Pennsylvania Station, New York City. Connections to the New York City Metropolitan Transient Authority subway and buses, taxis, and multiple connecting Amtrak trains. Check with a station attendant for exact route information. Wherever your journey takes you, we hope it's a pleasant one."

Everything will be fine, Amy reminded herself. It was just a train trip; what could possibly go wrong?

* * *

Amtrak called it community dining, but it really meant sitting and eating with strangers. It was true that the car attendant would bring you a meal to your private compartment if you preferred, but Sheldon had learned the wait could be lengthy and that the food was often cold by the time it arrived.

Lunch arrived somewhere in New Mexico, although Sheldon noted with concern that it was well before Albuquerque instead of in the thick of it as it should have been, and he made his way to the dining car. He stood in the doorway and waited to be acknowledged by the staff in order to find out what uncomfortable dining companion he would have.

The previous evening, he'd been sat at a table with a mother and two small children. The children had been loud and squirmy and conversation was limited to their mother telling them to sit still and behave. But the most uncomfortable thing about the experience was the top the older boy had; he set it spinning it on the table near the beginning of the meal and yet it went on far longer than it should have, given the friction from the tablecloth and the air and movement of the train constantly changing the level of the table. Just when Sheldon was certain it would surely topple, unable to maintain its gyrations, the boy would stop it and spin it again.

It was almost enough to convince him to suffer through cold food for all future train journeys.

He was waved forward and breathed a sigh of relief when he was sat at a table facing only a single gentleman. And gentleman was the correct term. The man was overdressed for the train, in an immaculate suit complete with waistcoat and bow tie. There was even a small cone of tiny flowers pinned to his lapel. If he'd had a walking stick and gloves, Sheldon wouldn't have been surprised. It was not his attire, though, that Sheldon found the most intriguing. His tilted head was shaped perfectly like an egg and, there, in the middle of his face, was the most luxuriant mustache Sheldon had ever seen. It was oiled and arranged with perfect care to curl up at the ends. The gentleman may have been balding, but this mustache was thick and coal black, so black it gleamed almost blue in the desert sun.

Sitting down with apprehension, Sheldon returned the tight smile that greeted him above the menu. Fortunately, the man left him in peace as he studied the menu, and he didn't extend his hand as so many men on the train did.

"If you would please tell to me, what is a quesadilla?" he suddenly asked, his accent soft and clipped, over stressing the "s" sounds and mispronouncing the food in question. Quoi-SE-dilla, he said.

"CASE-a-dilla," Sheldon corrected him before explaining. "It's is a tortilla that filled with cheese and other ingredients before it is folded in half and grilled so that the cheese melts."

"Ah! It is Mexican, then?"

"Yes. They are originally from the central and southern regions of Mexico, although those utilize corn tortilla and here they are almost always flour tortillas."

"Then I shall try one. We are in New Mexico, no? And the ubiquitous American ranch dressing! It will be an intelligential exercise, le manger." He lowered the menu, his entire face in full view now, and said, "I am called Hercule. It is my pleasure to make your acquaintance."

Something about the name and the man's appearance tickled at the edge of Sheldon's brain, and the fact that he didn't immediately recall it disturbed him.

"Are you unwell?" Asked the . . . Frenchman?

Sheldon shook his head. "No. I just had the most singular sensation of forgetting something."

"It is a great tragedy, the loss of a little grey cell," Hercule nodded sharply.

"Little grey cell?" Sheldon asked, but the answer was not given as the waitress came to take their order. They both ordered the chicken bacon ranch quesadilla.

"I don't believe you've told me your name," his lunch companion said.

"Dr. Sheldon Cooper."

"Bon! A doctor of medicine?"

"No. A doctor of physics."

"The study of objects in motion, n'est-ce pas? How intriguing." He took a sip of his water in what could only be termed a delicate fashion. "There is a famous quandary of mathematics about the movement of trains, is there not? One train leaves a station whilst another train leaves an opposite station. I had to made use of it once."

"A speed distance problem," Sheldon supplied. "But that's a very simplistic algebra equation. I was able to solve those from my crib."

"Bien sur, bien sur." The waitress came and set down their plates, inquiring if they wanted anything else.

"We both exercise our little gray cells daily, is it not so?" Hercule asked after he had studied his quesadilla with care and picked up his knife and fork.

"Little gray cells?" Sheldon asked again, picking up a piece of his and dipping it in the guacamole packet he'd already opened. But then he wished he hadn't; guacamole reminded him of avocados and avocados reminded him of Amy and . . .

Hercule tapped his temple with his stubby index finger. "The seat of all intelligence, mon ami. One need not lift a finger to solve a problem, if one applies the little gray cells."

"Brain cells?" Sheldon let the man nod although he knew it to be correct. "I quite agree. One needn't undergo any unnecessary physical exhortation to solve the mysteries of the universe. Although I often find a marker and whiteboard helpful."

"I find the train helpful for the application of the mind. The sway of the cars, a rhythm to steady and order the troubling thoughts. The scenery passing out the window, it is very restful, is it not?"

"I suppose so."

"Is that why you have traveled this way? To solve a problem?"

"No. Well, perhaps. It's my girlfriend. I'm traveling to surprise her. She doesn't know I'm coming." Sheldon said it without much forethought, surprising himself, but it felt like a relief to say it aloud.

"Ah, the delights of young love! How is this a problem?"

Uncertain why he telling a stranger this information, Sheldon explained, "In order for it to be a surprise, I had to lie to her in regards to my whereabouts. It is not something I do well or frequently, and it makes me . . . uneasy."

"The alibi is the problem, you mean to say?"

Sheldon raised his eyebrows and then nodded. Just an alibi, that's what he needed. A better one than laryngitis.

"And your lady friend, she will employ her own little grey cells?"

"Oh, yes! In fact, she quite enjoys slicing up little grey cells, dissecting them, and studying them under a microscope."

Hercule blanched across the table, one of the precisely cut bites of the quesadilla half-way to his mouth.

"She's a neurobiologist," Sheldon added.

There was another of his tight smiles, and he said, "Ah! I see! An educated woman." He took his bite, chewed it carefully, swallowed it, took a drink of water, and dabbed his lips with the corner of his napkin in a particular fashion. It was the same set of actions he took for every single bite, his meal habits apparently as fastidious as a cat.

"Tell to me, do you not think," Hercule leaned forward, his eyes shining like said cat's, "that a woman with her own gray cells, who studies the little gray cells, will solve the mystery on her own?"

Sheldon put down his wedge of tortilla with a sigh, his stomach knotting. "I suppose so."

"Do you love this educated woman?"

"Very much so!" Sheldon cried, the words bursting out of his chest with a force his brain would not normally have allowed.

"And this lovely woman, you have . . . a tendresse?"

Tilting his head at the old-fashioned French expression, Sheldon lowered his eyes. "Yes."

"May Mousier Hercule, I who have solved all the great mysteries, give to you some advise?"

"Very well," Sheldon said softly.

"There is no reward for hiding the truth. The truth always finds a way to the light. Most especially if she has seen your little gray cells."

Sheldon nodded deeply and looked out the window. He was not one to share confidences of the heart with a stranger or to accept advice from one on the matter, but there was something in this man's manner than made him listen. Behind that preposterous mustache and soft voice was the voice of indisputable logic.

"We are behind schedule, is that not so?" Hercule's voice broke his thoughts and Sheldon turned back.

The little man was holding out in front of him a turnip pocket watch, attached to his waistcoat via a thin matching chain.

"Yes, we are. I believe we are following a freight train; the tracks in the west are owned by the freight companies and Amtrak only pays for their use. The freight trains get priority," Sheldon explained. "Is that an antique Belgian pocket watch?"

"Oui, mon ami! I've had it for many years, since I was on the police force there . . ."

* * *

Sheldon waited until he knew Amy would be home from work, but not so long that it was her time to Skype him. He would have loved to see her face, but he was becoming extremely concerned about the amount of battery power left on his phone. During his layover in Chicago the next day, he'd have to locate a store and buy a charging cable. And a toothbrush. And some underpants.

After he'd made sure the door to his compartment was locked, he took out his phone and dialed her number.

"Hello? Sheldon?" he could hear the surprise in her voice. "Is everything okay?"

"Hello. I missed you and thought I'd call first," he explained.

"Oh, okay." Her voice softened. "I miss you, too. I'm glad to hear your voice."

His stomach twisted at what that comment implied. Because she thought he didn't have one earlier. When he'd lied to her. "Me, too," he said.

There was a pause, a strange sort of vaguely uncomfortable halt in conversation he was not used to around Amy. It occurred to him that that strange little man at dinner was correct, Amy at least suspected something unusual was happening. He needed to confess the truth and as soon as possible.

He heard a noise through his phone and pulled it away from his ear with a frown. Perfect. Here he was, calling and about to confess that he'd lied to his girlfriend about being ill, to inform her he was coming to visit her, and there was some sort of echo in the connection. It almost sounded like he could hear the movement of the train on Amy's end of the call, which of course was not the case. Amy was home alone in her temporary housing, probably sitting on her sofa or making dinner.

Taking a deep breath, he put the phone back to his ear. "Amy, I have a confession to make. I lied to you."

And he waited in near silence, the only sound being the echo of the clickety-clack of the rails between them.

_To be continued . . ._

* * *

_**Thank you in advance for your reviews!** _


	3. Chapter 3

"I understand if you're angry with me, and you have every right to be, but please hear why," Sheldon's voice continued on the other end of the phone, an almost pleading tone creeping between his words. "I lied about being ill. I didn't have laryngitis. I lied because if we had a video call you would see I'm not at home. I'm coming to you, Amy."

Amy released a sigh of pent-up frustration and looked around the coach car of train. No one was sitting very close to her, several people having gone to the dining car for dinner, but still she didn't want to disturb anyone. "Thank you for telling me," she said softly. "To what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?"

Was it her imagination or was there an extra long pause before Sheldon replied? "I, um, missed you."

She frowned slightly, surprised and confused about the slight stuttering of his answer. Normally Sheldon was very precise in his speech, just as precise as he was in his thoughts. "No other reason?" she asked. He had left in the middle of the day without telling anyone, Penny said.

"I - I realized I needed to be with you, to talk to you face to face."

Again a hint of uncertainty in his words.

"Are you flying in?" Amy asked. She felt dishonest as soon as the question left her mouth. She knew the answer. Sheldon would probably be more comfortable if she just told him everything she knew.

"No. I'm taking the train. I'm on the Southwest Chief to Chicago now and then I'll be getting on the Lake Shore Limited there. At least," he lowered his voice to a grumble, "I hope so. There has been a great deal of freight traffic and now we're at least two hours behind. I hope I don't miss my connection there."

She sat up straighter. "What happens if you do?"

"It is dependent on how late the train is. Most likely I'll have to wait in Chicago for the next day's train. Sometimes, though, they reroute a passenger if the time tables work out so that another route will get you to your final destination sooner."

"Reroute? A different train altogether?"

"Yes. Or even a bus. But don't worry, Amtrak always makes arrangements to get you to your final destination. I'll get to New Jersey, I promise. But I must say, I appreciate your interest in the intricacies of train travel. You should try it yourself sometime."

It was the perfect opening. All Amy had to do was open her mouth and say, "Actually, I'm experiencing the intricacies of train travel myself at this exact moment." She could tell him not to worry about the train being late into Chicago or missing his connection, that she'd be there to meet him. They could spend their weekend in the Windy City or they could plan their onward journey together.

But she didn't.

She wasn't sure what held her back. She had heard the palpable guilt and then the relief in Sheldon's voice as he confessed his lie to her. And his motive was pure. How many years had she longed for Sheldon to miss her enough to not only verbalize that but also to rush across the country to see her again?

But . . . there was something in his hesitation, something in his sudden departure in the middle of a routine work day that worried her. And that something was Dr. Ramona Nowitzki. The absence of her name in his narrative somehow felt like an overwhelming presence.

"Amy?"

"Sorry, I was thinking. I mean, about you coming. When you'd get here, what we could do, everything." It sounded weak to own ears. Then, her voice stronger with honestly, "I can't wait to talk to you. I feel like we have so much to discuss."

"Me, too."

Another pregnant pause. This one, though, was interrupted by an announcement that the dining car was now calling those with six o'clock dinner reservations.

"What was that?" Sheldon asked.

"Nothing, just the television." It slipped out so easily. "But my dinner is almost ready. I'm sorry, I should go."

"Of course. Have a good evening. I probably won't call again as my phone is rapidly losing power."

"I'm very much looking forward to our conversation in person," Amy said. "And I love you." She would end the phone call with honesty, if nothing else.

"I love you, too. Goodbye. Have a good meal."

"Thank you. Goodbye."

She put her phone back in her purse with an unsettled heart and then went to the dining car for her six o'clock dinner reservation.

* * *

 There was something familiar about her dining companion. Although it seemed odd that Amy couldn't place where in the world she'd seen the woman in the bright red trench coat and matching broad-brimmed red fedora. The hat was angled rakishly over her black hair, its deep shadow obscuring her eyes from view. Only the tip of her dark honey-colored nose and the full, sensuous pout of her red lips were visible.

"Hi. I'm Amy Farrah Fowler," Amy introduced herself.

"Carmen," the woman's voice oozed, heavy and dusky.

Picking up her menu, Amy fanned herself gently. "Aren't you a little hot in that coat? I think it's warm in here. I'm thinking about taking off my sweater."

"I enjoy the heat. I find it spicy."

"Ooookkkay."

Amy perused the menu in silence, noting that her companion didn't do so. Instead, she kept her face turned, looking out the window as New York State passed by. It occurred to Amy that her posture kept her face hidden from those that walked past the table. The waiter came and took their orders, and Carmen ordered the flat iron steak and some red wine. "Very rare," she clipped.

"So, are you traveling for business or pleasure?" Amy attempted again. Eating across from a silent stranger would surely only be awkward.

"For me, they are one and the same."

"Well, that's good. I enjoy my work a great deal, too."

The waiter returned with wine, and, despite the fact she barely turned to acknowledge him, Carmen said, "Bring a glass for my new friend, too."

"Friend?" Amy almost choked.

"I can smell a person with a secret. And people with secrets are almost always my friends. Ms. Fowler, whom are you running from?"

"It's Dr. Fowler. And I'm not running from anyone. I'm running toward someone. And he's not running away, either. At least -" she bit off her words as the waiter poured her some wine into the plastic wine glass.

There was a faint smile around Carmen's lips before her wineglass reached them. "Your lover?"

Something in the way she said it sent a not unpleasant shiver down Amy's spine. She managed to imbue the very word with its meaning, the sounds of the letters feeling like Sheldon's breath close upon her barest and most delicate skin, like goosebumps rising. Amy blushed. "Well, yes. But he's my boyfriend. Not just my lover. We love each other, ours is a connection of equal minds first and foremost."

"And yet you redden at the mere thought of what his body does to you," Carmen chuckled.

"I'm not sure this is the most appropriate conversation to have in public with a stranger," Amy rebutted. How was this woman even able to tell she blushing, given how hard she was working to keep her own face in shadow? She leaned forward and whispered, "But you cannot imagine what his body does."

This made Carmen turn, and for the first time, Amy saw her brown eyes flashing something mysterious and clever.

"I like you, Amy. You have verve. Now, tell me, what is your lover running from?"

"I didn't say he was!" Amy protested over the arrival of their dinner.

There was pause before Carmen replied, as they waited for the waiter to walk away. "Another woman?"

"No. Don't be silly."

"I am never silly about a life on the run."

"It is not a life on the run. There was just this other scientist and she's tall and blonde and an Olympic swimmer and she was there but I was in New Jersey and - oh! never mind. The point is he is coming to see me and I'm traveling to meet him. He loves me."

"Are you certain he would not stray?"

Amy almost choked on her baked potato. There it was, four words from a stranger. Words her mind had been dancing around for two whole days now but not daring to utter.

* * *

 He was already awake when the quiet hours ended and the first stop of the morning was announced. Not that Sheldon was up. He'd remained stretched out on the lower bunk, his feet just dangling off the edge and touching the sleeping compartment door. He hadn't opened the curtains yet, but his head was situated just under the edge and he could see a bright blue sky sliding past.

Sighing and getting up, he rolled his shoulders and neck. He had thought he would sleep better. He hadn't been sleeping well without Amy, missing the warm heaviness of her form next to him in bed, but the swaying of the train on previous journeys had always rocked him to sleep like a lullaby.

Plus, he'd confessed to her last night and the weight lifted from his chest should have freed his mind from the strangest dreams he'd been having lately. Those had started not long after Amy left for New Jersey, too. Dreams about drowning, something ensnaring him down under the blue waters of a swimming pool, his eyes open and burning in the chlorine, seeing Amy sitting on the edge, but he was unable to scream or reach out and touch her. Instead he could only feel this other thing, this thing he didn't understand and couldn't see, clawing at him.

Until the night before he'd left, the night Penny had explained to him what she thought Ramona was doing. That night, he could see her, grasping at his ankles, a blonde Ursula, dragging him down.

He pushed the images from his mind as he rushed through his morning shower, not wanting to feel the water anymore than he had to, and he grimaced as he put back on his dirty clothes. Yes, defiantly, some new underpants.

The last call for the stop came, and Sheldon's ears perked up. Topeka, Kansas. He pulled open the curtain and looked at the blue sign on the wall of the station. Three hours behind schedule.

* * *

 When Amy first boarded the Lake Shore Limited, she was impressed by the coach seating. The chair was wide and comfortable with generous leg room. There was plenty of space above for her luggage, a shower and changing room downstairs, and even an outlet to plug in her phone. Why would she ever fly again with amenities like this? But the next morning, as she stretched her tight muscles and smacked her mouth, she realized that sleeping in a chair in one's clothes was still not ideal. Much better than an airplane, yes, but still not her bed.

Of course, her bed in New Jersey hadn't been that welcoming, either. Oh, it was decently comfortable, but it was empty of Sheldon's presence. Amy had not realized how much she'd come to appreciate his warmth in the night. Even worse than all that, though, was that she'd been having strange dreams while there, about The Little Mermaid of all things. At first, they were innocent; she'd be sitting on a rock by the sea combing her hair with a dinglehopper, for example. But in the past few days, they'd been violent; she'd be sitting there, her new legs as painful as razors, watching the sky blue water churn and twist, something dark and frightening beneath them, but, with neither her voice nor her fins, she was unable to stop it.

She shook the thoughts away. They were just dreams. She was just missing Sheldon and anxious to do well and prove her worth on her fellowship, that's all. They didn't mean anything. Anything at all. Once she and Sheldon were in Chicago and had a nice long talk, they'd fall asleep peacefully in a hotel bed.

For now, she needed to shower, change clothes, and get some breakfast before the mid-morning arrival in Chicago. The call for Fort Wayne, Indiana came over the public address system and Amy glanced down at her watch. Right on time.

* * *

**S: Only 10% battery remaining. Going to turn phone off to conserve power. Train 3.5 hours behind schedule. Layover may be too short to find and purchase charger. But I will find a way to inform you if there are any changes to my route. I love you.**

* * *

 Chicago's Union Station was everything Pennsylvania Station could have been if it had not been torn down years ago. The Great Hall soared above her, and Amy tilted her head back to get a better look at the ceiling. The grated skylight curved overhead, filling the sandstone and marble space with natural light. The buzz of travelers whorled around her.

Amy would have loved to explore more and to take some photos of the grand staircases and their hexagonal coffered ceilings, but she needed to determine exactly when and where Sheldon would arrive. Turning around, pulling her suitcase behind her, she followed the signs to the Amtrak information desk, only stopping to look at the departure and arrivals board, which confirmed that the Southwest Chief was running late.

After obtaining information that Sheldon's train was not due until at least six that evening, the helpful man at the desk volunteered how she could store her suitcase for the duration. Taking advantage of his offer, Amy decided she might as well go sight-seeing, find a hotel close by that she and Sheldon could stay in that night, and perhaps enjoy some of that famous deep dish pizza.

**S: I've been rerouted. Getting off in Galesburg, IL and taking a bus to Indianapolis then the Cardinal to New York via Washington, D.C. Turning phone off again, almost dead.**

Amy didn't hear her phone chime over the cacophonous noise of Chicago traffic.

* * *

 It was beautiful, black and gleaming in the late afternoon sun. A CB&Q engine 3006, a Hudson class S-4, 4-6-4 locomotive, built by the Baldwin Locomotive Works in 1930. Sheldon licked his lips in appreciation outside the Galesburg, Illinois train station. He only had an hour and half before the bus was due to take him and handful of fellow travelers to Indianapolis. He had to find somewhere in this little town to buy a phone charger and some underpants, if nothing else. The clerk at the desk had suggested trying the Dollar General Store three blocks away. He knew he really ought to go back to the station so he could use one of their outlets to charge his phone. His stomach growled, reminding him he hadn't eaten since lunch and there would be no food on the bus. That needed attended to, also.

But the massive restored locomotive at the Galesburg Railroad Museum called to him, a long lonesome sound like a train whistle on the plains at night.

He could charge his phone on the Cardinal train. He'd already sent Amy a text telling her about his reroute, and there wasn't anything she could about it from New Jersey. Maybe he wouldn't even text her again until tomorrow morning. If the Cardinal left Indianapolis at midnight, that was too late to wake Amy with a text. Surely she was sleeping better than he was.

Sheldon turned away from the locomotive with a brisk step. Yes; Dollar General, Railroad Museum, and the bus, in that order. It wasn't as though Amy was waiting somewhere to meet him.

* * *

 Amy ran back to the station in a blind panic, racing through a crosswalk even with the hand flashing at her to be careful. A car honked loudly. Her stomach pulled at her, the heavy mound of deep dish pizza rebelling against the fast movement. She pressed her hand against the stitch in her side.

"Indianapolis!" she cried, running up the Amtrak ticket desk. "I need to get to Indianapolis!"

"Calm down, miss," the agent said, not unkindly. "You have plenty of time. The Hoosier State doesn't leave for another hour."

"When does it arrive? My boyfriend is on a bus from, um -" she fumbled for her phone to read the text "- Galesburg, Illinois and then he's getting on the Cardinal train. I need to meet him in Indianapolis, though."

The agent typed on his keyboard and looked back her. "You should make it. The Hoosier State arrives at 11:39 p.m. and the Burlington Trailways bus should arrive at 11:20 p.m., provided it's on time. So he should already be there."

Pursing her lips, Amy considered her options. "When does the Cardinal leave? He doesn't know I'm going to be there and I can't get ahold of him. His phone is dead." She had tried to text him and even to call him when she'd finally received his message, but all her calls went straight to voicemail.

The agent pulled at his face. "The Cardinal leaves at 11:59 p.m."

"So twenty minutes. I have twenty minutes," Amy murmured. "That's plenty."

"Well, if he's getting on the Cardinal, he has to be on board by 11:44. We don't board less than fifteen before the train leaves. So you really only have five minutes. I'm not sure it's the best place to catch someone."

"Give me a ticket," Amy declared. "He won't be getting on that train."

* * *

 The WiFi on the Hoosier State train was excellent, and Amy read all about the Indianapolis Union Station on the way there as she slid past the twilight farms of the Midwest. A storm was approaching and she could see lightening in the distance once darkness fell.

Opened in 1888, it was the first station in the country to be named Union Station for the Union Railway Company. It was an ornate and colorful building, Romanesque in style instead of the clean lines of Chicago's Art Deco structure. At first, Amy was disappointed to learn the restored Great Hall was now used only a banquet space by the Crowne Plaza hotel that owned most of the building, but she couldn't believe her luck that the hotel offered rooms in thirteen restored Pullman train cars. Sheldon would love that!

A deep rumble of thunder interrupted her thoughts and then the train noticeably slowed.

"Folks," came an announcement, "this is your conductor here. We're going to slow down a little through this storm. We've received notice of straight-line winds ahead. Don't worry, it shouldn't delay our arrival by too long, just a few minutes or so."

With a deep groan, Amy threw her head back into the seat. Even five minutes was too long.

* * *

 It was unnecessary of Amtrak to warn him that his connection in Indianapolis was tight and that he would need to immediately exit the bus and walk through the small terminal, up the two flights of stairs to the platform, and board the Cardinal bound for New York City. However, as Sheldon was acutely aware, almost no one was as intelligent as him. Except Amy.

The risk of bus rides were not unheard of on Amtrak, and Sheldon had experienced it before. This bus ride was better than most. The bus was not even half full, the distance was not so great, and the late hour seemed to quiet all the passengers. A storm could be seen in the distance, a harsh line of low gray clouds punctuated with lightening bolts. But they seemed to be traveling behind it, and, other than some rain, it did not impede their journey into Indiana.

He spent the first part of the journey transferring his Dollar General Store purchases into the black backpack he'd also bought there. The store was old and over-stuffed and not the cleanest, but fortunately all his purchases came in sealed packages. A few snacks, a few toiletries, some underpants (although not white), some socks, even two solid colored tee shirts, and the essential phone charging cable.

The farther the bus travelled on Interstate 74, the more Sheldon regretted his decision to visit the railroad museum and not charge his phone. He could have been talking to Amy now that they were in the same time zone. It would have to be texts, as Sheldon didn't want others to overhear the details of his private life, but at least it would be something

Immediately after he'd informed Amy that he was on the train and coming to see her, he'd felt a relief at confessing his lie about being ill, about obscuring his whereabouts from her. But it hadn't lasted.

He'd had the dream again last night, and this time Ursula-Ramona had her lips painted a lurid red color, and she managed to pull him down further under the water, those lips puckering like fat blisters and they came closer and closer - He had woken suddenly, gasping and coughing, in his sleeping compartment.

Afraid of a repeat, he didn't sleep on the bus even as he heard others snoring softly around him; instead he'd watched the water run in black rivets down the window, midnight in Indiana approaching out the window. As they pulled off the Interstate into downtown Indianapolis, he thought he heard a train whistle in the distance.

* * *

 The bus was precisely one minute late. Sheldon grabbed his backpack and climbed down the stairs into the night, turning toward the glow of the combination train and bus terminal.

"Oh, I'll never make it on time," he heard a pitiful cry behind him.

The heartbreak in the voice was painful, and he turned. An elderly lady coming off the bus was struggling to get her oversized suitcase down the stairs. "Will you help me?" she pleaded, when she caught him looking at her. "I have to get on that train! And I don't know where I'm going!"

Because his mother raised him right, Sheldon nodded and leaned forward to take the heavy luggage from the woman. "We go through the terminal and up the stairs to the platforms. We have to hurry."

"Stairs! Is there an elevator?" she asked. " And I need an arm to hold onto."

"Yes, but quickly," he said.

She wound her arm, light and as feeble as a bird's, through his. Between the weight of her suitcase and her much shorter stature, Sheldon had to bend over to lead her through the terminal and to the elevator.

* * *

 Why did she bring this heavy suitcase? Amy cursed, giving one more strong pull then almost falling backwards from its weight as it toppled out the overhead rack.

"Careful there," someone said.

"I'm in a hurry!" she explained, trying her best to race down the aisle between the seats and off the train, but it was difficult while holding the large case in front of her.

Stepping out of the train, she sucked in her breath. There were no other trains, just a couple of empty tracks on the other side of the platform.

"Oh! No!" Amy cried out. "It's gone!"

"Are you looking for something?" the Amtrak employee who was helping people down asked.

"The Cardinal train! Is it still here?" she had to shout over the sound of the engines, still running.'

"Not for long."

"Where?"

"Over there," he nodded toward the train they'd just got off of, "behind us. You can't see it. You'd better hurry, it's about to leave."

As if to punctuate his sentence, Amy heard the cry of "All aboard!" from somewhere in the cavernous space, echoing off the iron girders.

"You can't cross the rails, go to the end of the platform and turn left," the man called after her as ran, pulling her suitcase behind her.

* * *

 "All aboard!" yelled the conductor, just as Sheldon practically pushed his elderly companion up the steep stairs into a coach car. His ticket was for another first class sleeping compartment, but he'd have to get there from inside. There just wasn't time to walk down the outside of the train to the correct car.

"That you so much! You're such a kind young man," the woman turned to look at him from the top step.

"You're welcome," Sheldon said, pulling himself up behind her just as the conductor slammed the exterior door shut behind him.

* * *

 Engine. Baggage car. Crew car. First class sleeping cars. Yes, he'd be there, right? He'd want his own bathroom. Amy ran down the edge of the Cardinal, is engines running louder now, the metallic sound of heavy doors being shut and locked.

It wouldn't leave for fifteen minutes, right? She'd been told about this, that boarding closed fifteen minutes before departure. But surely they'd let someone off?

"Sheldon!" she yelled. All the windows were tinted and she couldn't see inside. She pounded her first on the metal hull of the train, but the sound of it was muffled by the train and her own screams.

* * *

 He walked forward, through the observation car and the empty dining car, forward toward first class. At each breezeway between cars, he read the car number before pressing the large button to open the door. Then, in the second car, the one that was his, he counted the rooms in the small hallway to find his compartment.

The train lurched to life under his feet and the whistle blew, loud and strong even here, inside the car. On instinct, Sheldon pressed his fingertips against the wall to steady himself.

"Look out there! Do you see that? What is she doing?" he heard someone in the room adjacent to him say.

Setting his backpack on the blue bench, Sheldon went to the window of his compartment to see what was happening.

He had to crane his neck to see, but then he gasped at the sight. It was only the back of her, tugging a suitcase behind her, but he'd know that cardigan and mud-brown hair anywhere. "Amy!" he yelled, uselessly.

He ran, skipping steps down the steep spiral staircase at the center of the car, into the central opening on the lower level, between the family/handicap bedrooms and the luggage storage and the extra bathrooms. He ran to the door in the middle of the car, the ones that were opened at all the stops on the Superliners. The train was picking up speed.

Sheldon pressed his palm to the small glass window there and yelled her name again, as Amy shuttered past him, standing still and looking devastated on the platform.

_To be continued . . ._

* * *

  ** _Sorry to give some of you heart palpitations! What will happen now? Thank you in advance for your reviews!_**


	4. Chapter 4

He stood in the middle of the train car, his hand still pressed to the window, long after the bright lights of Indianapolis had faded and all that was left was the darkness of farms beyond.

There was a part of Sheldon that couldn't believe what he just saw. It felt surreal, like a mirage. There was no logical reason for the woman on the platform, the woman with tears streaming down her face as the train accelerated past her, to be Amy. Amy was in New Jersey, waiting patiently for his arrival. Amy would have told him she was coming to meet him, Amy would have asked his opinion before she even left, Amy would have shared the details of her plan, and Amy wouldn't have lied to him via omission when he discussed his own journey.

But she had, just as he had.

Sheldon closed his eyes with a long sigh, finally dropping his hand. Amy had known all along. Leonard or Penny must have told her. Or, as that strange little man Hercule had suggested, she'd deduced it all on her own using her little gray cells. Even via text, Sheldon was still an unsuccessful liar.

But why would she come to meet him? She had work to do, a fellowship. It would not be wise for her to leave for an extended period of time.

'You idiot,' Sheldon chided himself, 'because you're not a successful liar. Amy knows you're hiding something. Still.'

With that thought berating him, Sheldon returned to his sleeping compartment, all the other doors closed as everyone slept, no doubt worry-free, behind them. He tore open the package to his new phone charger and plugged in his phone, agonizing that it was so dead it took it a few seconds to even turn on.

* * *

Her phone ring just as she pulled her nightgown over her head. After a good sob on the platform, she'd found her way to the hotel that filled most of Union Station and requested a room. Instead of the joy she expected, it pained her when they told her only the Pullman Car rooms were left the night. It felt wrong to take it alone, but she was exhausted and she had no choice.

Sheldon. His face lit up her screen as it changed to a photo of him. It always made her smile, this photo, his tongue stuck out in protest because he didn't see the need for her to take it.

Amy's heart leapt at the sight. Had he seen her on the platform? Did he know? Or was it just that he'd finally restored power to his phone and he was so eager to talk to her that he risked waking her in the middle of the night?

"Hello, Sheldon," she picked it up, her breath caught in her throat.

"It was you, wasn't it? On the platform?" he asked without preamble.

She let out the breath. "Yes. The train was late because of the storm and I missed you getting on."

"You should have told me you were coming."

"Like you told me you were coming to see me?" she shot back, anger flaring, fed by her exhaustion and disappointment.

"That's fair," Sheldon replied in a very small voice.

"I'm sorry, Sheldon. I shouldn't have yelled. And, yes, I should have told you. This has all turned into a mess of my own making. I'm stuck here in Indianapolis for the night and you're on your way East and . . . " Amy didn't finish the sentence, the futility of it being too overwhelming.

"The mess is not entirely of your own making," he said, his voice still small and, Amy thought, sad.

"Sheldon?" she asked softly, something in his voice stopping her heart.

"There's something else I need to tell you. I know that. And I will. But . . ." A pause. "I need time to sort it out for myself first, to think about what it all means, to decide how to explain it to you. Please, Amy."

_He would not stray?_

Amy sat down on the edge of the hotel bed with a thump.

"Amy?"

"Okay," she whispered, more because it was the path of least resistance than because it was want she wanted. "Sheldon, are we . . . are we okay?"

"Yes." He said it firmly and clearly. "At least, I want us very much to be. I have never been more sure of how much I want you in my life."

She had waited before. Many times, in many different ways. She could do it again. "Will you tell me when we meet face-to-face? I'd like that assurance."

"Yes. There's so much I want to say and ask you -" his voice caught "- in person."

"Alright. I'll wait."

"Did you get a hotel? Are you safe?" Sheldon asked.

"Yes," Amy answered, looking around. "You probably know this, but Union Station here is a hotel and they have rooms in restored Pullman cars. Although it's not any fun without you to point how it's not authentic enough."

"I won't keep you up; it's very late. But we'll talk tomorrow and make a plan? You've probably guessed I bought a phone charger."

"Tomorrow," Amy agreed. "Ten o'clock? I think we could both use the time to sleep in."

"Agreed. I love you, Amy."

"I love you, too."

* * *

But Amy could not sleep in. She had, surprisingly, fallen asleep quickly, probably from pure exhaustion, but the dreams about the pool of water had plagued her. She trusted Sheldon implicitly, and she would wait for him to be ready to discuss whatever weighed upon his mind, whatever had made him flee Los Angeles. Experience taught her that cajoling and force did not work with Sheldon; her patience was a far more powerful tool.

But that did not make the waiting any easier, and sitting alone and awake in the narrow train-car hotel room did make it any easier. She needed to move, she needed to find something to do.

It was early, very early, but being late May the sun was already shining in tones of pink and amber over the city. Cars went by her, whispering of the rush hour that was soon to come. She had stopped at the desk and was given a glossy map of downtown, one of those tourist maps with cartoon drawing of sights deemed interesting by some tourism board. The desk clerk had suggested the Canal Walk, reassuring it was both beautiful and safe. Also, being so early, it was open by virtue of being outdoors; the museums and the zoo and the baseball diamond along it would be closed for a few hours yet.

It was a pleasant walk, and not as deserted as Amy feared, as she was passed by many joggers, a few pair of walkers, and even some bicycle commuters, riding in their ties and helmets. She walked, lost in quickly forgettable thought, until her stomach growled. Consulting her map, she decided to take a more direct path to get back to the hotel for breakfast.

The path took her up the curve past the Eiteljorg Museum. How odd, she though, that a museum of cowboys and Native Americans should be located here, in Indianapolis, which did not immediately spring to one's mind when thinking about the Old West.

Amy stopped in front of the building to admire the fountain there, a group of whitetail deer leaping over rocks, through a stream, running toward (or from?) something unseen. It had movement and energy, and she appreciated its unique forms.

"It's a lovely morning, isn't it?" A voice came from her left and she jumped.

But it was just a woman. She must have been an employee reporting for duty, some sort of interruptive guide as her black hair was neatly plaited into two thick braids and she wore a dress of soft leather with matching moccasins.

"Yes, it is," Amy agreed.

"What brings you here?" asked the woman.

"I'm traveling through. I just spent the night here."

"Oh, I'm a bit a traveler myself. Where are you going next?"

"That's a good question," Amy muttered and then cleared her throat. "I don't know yet. I mean, it hasn't been decided. Either back East or back West."

"I have been to both. In the East, one knows what to expect. But in the West, there are only possibilities."

Amy smiled, amused. "Maybe."

"You are traveling alone?"

It was on the tip of Amy's tongue to make a snide remark about how nosey the stranger was being, but it was said with such earnestness, such innocence that she didn't. "No. Well, yes. Right now." She sighed deeply. "I don't know, that hasn't been decided yet, either."

"I traveled to the Pacific Ocean once. Not alone. We were seeking answers, running toward something, not away from it."

Sacagawea! It suddenly occurred to Amy who this woman was supposed to be personifying for the museum. And yet the museum wouldn't open for a few hours yet . . . "You really take your job seriously, huh?"

"Do you not?" Sacagawea - really, what else was Amy to call her? - asked.

"Of course I do," Amy shot back, turning brusquely to stare at the fountain and its leaping deer again. It was rude, she knew, but Sacagawea had hit upon the other item of concern Amy was trying to ignore. Here she was, semi-marooned in the middle of the country, and not reporting for her job. What was she going to about her fellowship? Could she afford to follow Sheldon around the country, trying to meet up with him, all in hopes that whatever this weight was upon him would be explained?

Could she afford not to?

"The answers you seek are in the west, where the land meets the water," Sacagawea said softly, as though her voice was disembodied and upon the wind.

Amy turned sharply to look at her, but no one was there.

* * *

It did not take long in the Crowne Plaza's business center to make the decision. Amy searched flights, too, knowing she could be back in Los Angeles by the end of the day if she flew. For some reason she could not explain, though, she felt that the journey needed to be completed by train. To see more of the country out the window? Because that is how it began? Because Sheldon preferred the train? To buy them both time?

He met her decision with protest on the screen, his head framed by the blue bench behind him, the soft clatter of the train in the background. "But I'm on my way to New York! I came to see you!"

"I know, I know. It's just . . ." Amy took a deep breath. "I want to go home, Sheldon, to our apartment, to be there with you. We were - are so happy there."

"What about your fellowship?" he asked, logical to a fault. Except for this strange train trip.

"I told them my mother is very ill. They're letting me defer it."

Sheldon's lips twisted. "But why back home? I've been happy, there, too, but we're both closer to New Jersey. And I have the vacation time."

Amy considered all his valid points. They weren't new to her. What could she say. 'I think I met the ghost of Sacagawea and she told me to travel West, to the ocean? That all my questions would be answered there?' No, of course not. She didn't even believe it herself.

Instead she explained, "I think you're running away from something, Sheldon. No, I'm not asking you to tell me right now," she added rapidly, seeing his mouth open to speak. "I promised I'd wait for you to be ready to tell me about it. But, if I'm correct, whatever it is you're running from probably needs faced and dealt with, not just hidden from."

In the screen of her phone, he looked away, light from the window obscuring his profile.

What it was that had happened, whatever had occurred in Los Angeles, affected him greatly, Amy could tell. Previously, she'd been worried for herself, fearful of those words that Carmen had uttered - _He would not stray?_ \- and the memory of Dr. Nowitski in their apartment, upon their love seat. But now her heart ached for him. Whatever it was, he was frightened of it. He seemed lost and confused, unable to sort out his emotions.

"Very well," he whispered. And his face turned back and his voice was firmer. "Let me figure out where to get off."

* * *

It had to be Charlottesville, Virginia. The Cardinal arrived at Washington, D.C. just after the Crescent left, so he would get of and wait in Charlottesville. At the station, Sheldon stored his backpack of Dollar General purchases and debated about how to kill the next five hours. He considered going to the University of Virginia and finding someone in the physics department to have a scholarly conversation with, but, as most of his free time was in the evening, he doubted one of the professors or researchers would want to stay around that late for an unannounced visitor.

Perhaps he looked lost, because the woman sitting on the bench next to him started to chat, which at first Sheldon found annoying until the lady mentioned she'd gone to the evening behind the scenes tour at Monticello the night before. "It was just wonderful. It's after regular closing time and there aren't any crowds. There were probably only a dozen of us."

Sheldon thanked her for the suggestion and went to hail a taxi.

* * *

Monticello, one of the most photographed homes in the world, was even more beautiful in person. Not normally a fan of guided tours, Sheldon enjoyed the docent's scientific bent. There were several of Thomas Jefferson's innovations on display in his bedroom and elsewhere, and the docent easily and concisely answered all of Sheldon's questions. It was, in all, a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours before returning to the train station.

The rest of the tour group broke off at the end of the house tour to visit the slave cabins, but Sheldon, finding the whole notion distasteful, elected to remains outdoors.

He walked briskly away from them, through the dirt of Mulberry Row, the trees arching over him. It would have been a beautiful walk, if it were not for the row of crude cabins that he passed. At last, the cabins ended and there was just the vegetable garden with its square pavilion. Sheldon crossed the rows of peas and lettuces to stand next to the red-brick structure with its large radius windows. All of the mountain fell down away from him and the evening sun cast a pink light over the sky.

He was just photographing that view, thinking it was the sort of romantic thing Amy would enjoy seeing, when he heard heavy footfalls in the dirt behind him. Turning, he saw a tall man with light red hair wearing a long coat and his hands clasped behind him. He was not someone from the tour, and then, when he looked up, Sheldon realized he must be a costumed interpreter. There had not been one for their tour, but perhaps during the normal business hours the property was swarming with dozens of these tall, red-headed men of noble bearing.

"Thomas Jefferson," Sheldon said, not a question.

"At your service." The man bowed gallantly and came to stand behind him. "It is lovely view, is it not?"

"Yes," Sheldon agreed. "I took a photo."

"Ah, photography. The art of capturing light for history."

"Yes." Sheldon was still watching the view, and he was glad the interpreter couldn't see his face.

"I find the view soothing when I am troubled. I, for one, have never stood among the peas and gazed in your manner without troubles."

Sheldon turned to look at him. "What troubles - oh, independence, the Constitution, getting aid from France, being President. Yes."

"And yet I could always come back to my mountaintop and spend my golden hours here." Jefferson - who else was Sheldon supposed to think of him as? - pointed to the square building next to them. "I did my best thinking in there. When the path was uncertain, the way unclear, when guilt obscured my view."

"Guilt?" Sheldon asked. "You're an American legend!"

Jefferson rotated further in his spot, his back to Sheldon now, and he looked down the line of trees on Mulberry Row, toward the slave cabins. "We scientists, those with great minds, live in a world of semantics. You think silence and semantics will soothe your breast at the end of the day, the voice of reason. They do not. History does not treat unexplained silences well; it tends to fill them with contradictions and speculations."

He turned back sharply, his lips tight. "Where is your mountain top, Sheldon? Do you have a place that has made you happier than all others?"

It flickered across Sheldon's mind that he had never said his name or his profession, but for some unexplainable reason it felt perfectly reasonable for Thomas Jefferson to know this.

"Yes," he whispered, thinking of breakfast together and Amy's delicious meals and working on math together and the curl of her against him on the love seat in the evenings. He thought of the laughter and the joy.

"Pray tell, my good sir, why do you not wish to return to your mountaintop?"

"I do!" Sheldon protested, but then, immediately remembering his guilt over his new found talent for lying, he added quickly, "It's just - it's just. Something happened that will make my girlfriend unhappy. I mean - it happened to me, I didn't want any part of it - but I don't know how to tell her about it. Talk about an uncertain path."

"It happened to you?" Jefferson clarified and Sheldon nodded in affirmation. "And you haven't told this woman who is your mountaintop yet?" Sheldon shook his head. "Semantics and silence."

Jefferson took a step toward the garden pavilion and opened one of the French doors. Two dark Windsor chairs sat inside. "Step inside, my friend. Have a seat. Do your best thinking."

Timidly, Sheldon stepped onto the centuries-old wooden floor of the small building. Wasn't this off limits to tourists? And yet, here was an employee offering him the chance few others would ever get. Sheldon sat upon one of the chairs, and it creaked beneath his weight.

"Aren't you coming?" he looked up to ask Jefferson but the legend was gone.

Before Sheldon could wonder too long at where he went, his phone chimed. He pulled it out to read the text.

**A: Got to Champaign, Illinois on time, should board City of New Orleans train at 10:30 p.m. Will switch there for Sunset Limited to LA. Took your advice and got a sleeping compartment. Going to find something to eat, you may not be able to reach me. Talk to you later - tomorrow?**

A text about semantics and silence.

Sheldon looked around him, trying to decide how to reply. All that was left was the sound of birds on the mountain and the rustle of the breeze in the trees and his pressing guilt.

_To be continued . . ._

* * *

_**Thank you in advance for your reviews!** _


	5. Chapter 5

_Sheldon was right_ , Amy thought as she returned to her sleeping compartment somewhere in Kentucky. She had boarded at 10:30 the night before, and she was so grateful when the car attendant immediately met her to turn down her room for the night. And, this morning, like magic even though she knew it was the hard work of that same attendant, her room had been returned to seating and cleaned while she was at breakfast.

Now, settled into that seat, Amy waited for her phone to ring. Sheldon had texted back last night, although a good half hour after she had originally sent her message, and agreed to her plan of a morning conversation. They chatted briefly, Sheldon saying he had done the evening tour at Monticello which was enjoyable "up to a point," whatever that meant. He seemed reticent on the whole experience, actually. But Amy was beyond being surprised by that.

She watched the trees out the window, so many it was almost a solid sheet of green. The track here was more curvy than it had been elsewhere on her journey, with the train traveling slower through the turns and the sensation of going up and down hills. Perhaps she was becoming a convert to this way of travel, to Sheldon's way of thinking. It was enlightening to see parts of the country she'd never seen before. Yes, the journey certainly took longer, but it was more relaxing, with no rush and squeeze at the airport and plenty of room for carry-on baggage. And a private compartment, no matter how snug, with a private bathroom? Delightful.

Honestly, she was relieved to have the time. Away from the stresses of her job and the hundreds of little mundane yet necessary tasks that make up a day, her mind was freer to contemplate. The only problem was that her contemplations on this journey were not as peaceful as they would have been were it a vacation. But she was grateful for it; if Sheldon had flown in and shown up at her door in just a few hours, without any warning, she would have been shocked to see him.

As her mind was on him, as it so often was, it was fitting that her phone choose that moment to ring. At exactly the scheduled time, of course. Sheldon's face filled the screen and it was fun to see the same blue bench behind him as she knew as now behind her. The blue benches were becoming quite familiar. Pleasantries were exchanged and Sheldon inquired into her enjoyment of the sleeping car. Amy asked him about the first part of his journey on the Crescent train. They chatted amiably, and it was almost possible for Amy to pretend there wasn't something unsaid hanging between them that had led them both to this ill-planned venture in the first place.

A natural lull occurred and then Sheldon took a deep breath. "Amy, I've decided to tell you why I left Los Angeles. I'm - I'm still not entirely sure how I feel about it, but I know I only feel worse for keeping it from you for so long. History does not treat unexplained silences well."

"Okay." Amy nodded, bracing herself for whatever was to come.

"You remember meeting Dr. Nowitzki?" Sheldon asked.

Amy's stomach plummeted. _He would not stray?_ "Yes, of course."

"That night after you met her, Penny informed me . . . Penny informed me that she thought Dr. Nowitzki was attempting to pursue a romantic relationship with me." Sheldon looked out the window, his Adam's apple bobbing from a gulp. "I didn't understand why Penny would say that because everyone, including Dr. Nowitzki, knew I was already in a relationship with you. But Penny said some woman don't care."

Still looking out the window, Sheldon stopped talking and seemed to be concentrating on something out of Amy's view.

"So, you left because of the conversation with Penny?" Amy asked softly, although relief filled her. Not that Dr. Nowitzki had designs on her man, of course, but that nothing untoward had happened, it was the mere idea that something might happen that had prompted Sheldon to leave.

"I didn't leave that night," he finally said. "I left the next day."

"Well, that's okay. You had to think about it a little first, I understand that."

"No, you don't understand," Sheldon said, harsher than he'd spoken to her in a very long time and Amy drew in a sharp breath.

"I didn't leave then because I just couldn't believe Penny. I enjoy Dr. Nowitzki as a colleague, I miss having you around to talk to about my work or even your work or our work together whenever I want. The military project was taken from us and you left, and I was there, all alone, and I let Dr. Nowitzki in, to talk to and eat lunch with and discuss physics."

"On, Sheldon, I'm so sorry you feel so alone." Amy's chest hurt. It was apparent that she shouldn't have taken the fellowship after all, now that all her of fears seemed to be coming true. Sheldon was lonely and lost without her, and he'd tried filling it with someone else and he either didn't see or refused to see what was happening. If only she'd stayed in Los Angeles -

"So, the next day when Ramona came to my office," Sheldon continued, and Amy tried not to let it bother her that he'd slipped into using her first name, "I asked her if it were true, if she was sexually attracted to me."

Amy's heart was thumping now in her chest, her breathing shallow. "And?"

"And . . ." Sheldon looked down, hiding his eyes from her. "And she kissed me," he whispered.

"What?!" Amy exploded. _He would not stray?_

"I didn't ask for it, I didn't want it, I promise, Amy," Sheldon looked up quickly. "It just happened before I even realized it was happening."

"How dare you?" she continued, her voice loud and no doubt carrying into the next compartment. She didn't care.

"I didn't kiss her back!" Sheldon protested. "It was entirely her doing! I was in my desk chair and she leaned over me and I couldn't move and I couldn't scream and I ran away as soon as I could!"

"Did you fight? Did you push her away?" Amy asked, her voice slightly quieter.

Sheldon looked down again and shook his head. "It was like I was paralyzed," he whispered. "Like I was Professor X, trapped in my chair."

"Really? You're going to try and compare this to comic books?"

"And several movies . . ."

"I need to hang up now, Sheldon," Amy said firmly, tears stinging her eyes.

"But Amy -"

"I'm sorry. Please don't call me. Let me call you when I'm ready to speak to you again."

"Oh." His eyes looked vacant on the other end of the screen, void of all their usual life. "Okay."

"Goodbye, Sheldon."

Amy ended the call and collapsed on the bench, sobbing, each rack of her body matching the sway of the train.

* * *

Georgia bled into Alabama with almost no difference in scenery, cotton and tobacco fields looking the same everywhere. Not that Sheldon was paying attention. Yes, he was still sitting on the bench in his compartment and his eyes were still aimed at the window, but he didn't see any of it.

All he could see was the look on Amy's face on the phone. Or, rather, the progression of faces: the shock, the disbelief, the anger, the hurt, the rejection. He remembered a time he couldn't read her emotions from her face, and he almost felt a regret that he'd lost that innocence. The knowledge of her pain writ large was enough to make him regret telling her, to disavow the value of honesty for the rest of his life. He and Ramona were the only people who knew about the kiss; it was possible Amy would have never found out, especially if he'd cut all ties with Ramona as he planned to do.

He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against the glass, hot from the southern sun. No, that would never work, either. He could never lie to Amy for that long, withhold something like that from her. It would make everything he did with her or everything he ever told her a deceit. It would eat their love alive from the inside out, and he knew it.

No matter how painful it had been, how painful it made things now, Amy deserved the truth. And he deserved all the blame she wanted to give him.

* * *

When the announcement for the fresh air stop in Memphis came, there was little that Amy wanted more at that moment than fresh air. The sleeping compartment she had found cute and charming at first felt claustrophobic and the air was stale to the point of putrid. Twenty minutes outside, even if walking along the edge of the train at the station, seemed necessary.

It was humid outside the train and noisy as there were several travelers boarding and detraining here, but Amy took a deep breath of the air anyway. She walked away from most of the crowd, toward the end of the train. There wasn't a caboose on Amtrak trains anymore, not real cabooses, and Amy was glad for it. The word caboose only reminded her of the time she and Sheldon spent at the historic railway yard.

Turning around at the end of the train, Amy's step faltered a bit and she looked down to see one of the velcro straps of her shoes had comes undone. Crouching down, she reached to reaffix it but, instead, the strap came completely off in her hand, the edge torn with a long piece of thread hanging from it.

"Great," she muttered, "this day just keeps getting better and better." She hadn't brought a spare pair of shoes. After standing, she tried a couple of steps, watching the shoe slide loosely around her foot.

"Why the long face, darlin'?" someone asked, and Amy looked up with a scowl. What kind of misogynist pig would dare call her -

"You've got to be kidding me," she groaned, rolling her eyes. There was no doubt who the man with the black wavy hair, the reflective sunglasses, and the sequined white jumpsuit was pretending to be. She'd been accosted by an Elvis impersonator. "Listen, I'm sure you're hoping for some tips after you sing a song or something, but I'm really not in the mood."

"Why not?" he asked. "Are you lonesome tonight?"

"First of all, it's mid-morning. Secondly, it's none of your business."

"Ah, but now you've tickled my interest. What's got you all shook up?"

Amy rolled her eyes again and crossed her arms. This guy really wan't going to take no for an answer. Yes, she could walk away, albeit slowly because of her shoe, but something about the absurdity of the situation compelled her to stay. "Fine, if you must know, my boyfriend just confessed to being kissed by another woman."

Elvis - she couldn't believe she was calling him that in her mind - let out a sharp whistle. "Got yourself a real hound dog, huh?"

"He is not! I said _being kissed,_ not that he kissed her," Amy said sharply and then took a fast breath.

"Well, darlin', it seems to me you have a decision to make. Is he yours and you are his, come what may? Can your precious love be erased by just another woman with a pretty face?"

"She's not even that pretty," Amy pouted, crossing her arms. "Her nose is too thin." The platform was clearing, so Amy straightened her back. "I need to go."

"Think about it. Does he love you tender and love you true?"

Tempted to roll her eyes again, Amy just said, "Um, yeah. Thanks?" She turned to walked back and her foot slid in the loose shoe again and she mumbled something under her breath.

"I got just the thing for that," Elvis said, holding out a shoebox to her. Which was odd, because Amy didn't remember seeing a box next to him.

"Was is this?" Amy asked, taking it anyway.

"All aboard!" came the call and Amy walked away as quickly as she could under the circumstances, clutching the box to her. Back in her compartment, she opened it and burst out laughing. It was a pair of blue suede oxfords, beautiful if not her usual style.

The whistle blew and the train lurched forward over the sounds of Elvis out the window.

 _Train train, comin' 'round, 'round the bend  
__Train train, comin' 'round the bend  
__Well it took my baby, but it never will again  
__Train train, comin' down, down the line  
__Train train, comin' down the line  
__Well it's bringin' my baby, 'cause she's mine all, all min_ e

Amy knew before she even looked at the label affixed inside the shoe. They were exactly her size.

* * *

The train clattered slowly through the deep South, the hot, hazy sun through the windows making Sheldon sleepy. He'd had a single text from Amy that she was getting on the Sunset Limited at nine. That was it, no other words of a personal nature.

Silence and semantics. It was already too late.

A part of Sheldon wasn't surprised. No matter how it made him feel, the anger and the revulsion and the confusion of the moment, he hadn't pushed Ramona away. That was his crime and he would have to live with it for the rest of his life. Would he lose Amy over it? He understood that no one would blame her; he would always be the guilty party. It would always be his lips that had touched another's.

He would have to return to Los Angeles, pack up his things and return to his old bedroom across the hallway. If Leonard and Penny would have him again; they may not want to share their apartment with a cheater.

The exhaustion of the whole thing weighed him down. He felt almost sick with it all, the heat and the weariness and the disgust of his own actions. He reached up and touched his aching brow, feeling dizzy in the sun. It was hot in his compartment, and he felt clammy from it. Maybe his lunch hadn't agreed with him; he'd tried the new pork coconut sliders on the menu. Time seemed to stretch in front of him; was the train running behind schedule? He thought maybe so, but he lacked the energy to pull out his phone and compare the time to the route guide.

Moaning at his own discomfort, he stretched out on the bench, away from the window, resting his head on a pillow in the shadows. The white pillowcase was blessedly cool. Swallowing away bile building at the back of his throat, Sheldon fell into a fitful sleep.

* * *

"Sir, sir!"

There was a pounding on his locked sleeping compartment door and Sheldon awoke with a start. Still lying down, he reached over and unlatched the door. The car attendant slid it open and looked down at him.

"We're in New Orleans, sir. Don't you change trains here?"

"Huh? Oh, yes." Sheldon sat up but almost doubled over from the pain that squeezed at his temples. "I think I'm getting ill. Can you get malaria in the South?"

"It's the heat, sir. The air conditioning went down in the car back in Alabama. Do you need assistance to your connection?"

"My connection? Oh, yes, the Sunset Limited. At nine."

"It's 8:30. We were behind some and then it took me awhile to realize you were still here. I thought everyone had detrained. I'll help you, if you like."

"That won't be necessary," Sheldon said, standing with effort and grabbing the edge of the sink for support as he swayed.

"Are you sure you can make it? You don't look good."

"I have to. My girlfriend is supposed to be on the Sunset Limited at nine. I'm going to search the train for her."

Over the final concerns of his car attendant, Sheldon managed to get down the stairs and out to the platform. Slinging his backpack over his shoulder he walked with squinted eyes. The sheds were outdoors here, just a roof over the walkways and the shafts of late evening sun painfully pierced his eyes. Everything seemed louder, too, agonizing to his ears. Twice he stopped and leaned against a pole for support, his stomach churning. Was this a migraine? He'd never had one before.

Through painful eyes, he saw the sign for the Sunset Limited and made his way to one of the first class sleeping cars. He was too discombobulated to pull his phone out to check his eticket, but he was certain his eidetic memory wouldn't fail him now. This was his car, and, as expected, the bedroom number he remembered from his ticket was empty. He threw his backpack down as he shut the door behind him, barely making it to the bathroom in time to vomit.

Coming out of the toilet stall, he splashed water on his face from the room sink and cupped his hands to swish some around his dirty mouth. Oh, how he wished Amy were here! She'd knew just want to do about the pain sizzling through his head, she'd make it all better.

Amy.

She should be on this train somewhere. He needed to find her. Sheldon clutched the edge of the sink, fighting another wave of nausea. He turned, slowly to avoid losing him balance, and cranked the temperature knob all the way to the bottom. He crossed the compartment and pulled the curtains shut. The rush of cold air from the vent above and the sudden darkness helped marginally.

Amy.

He couldn't find her, not now, not like this. He could barely walk. And she'd yet to call him or text him. She was still silent, thinking about him angrily, no doubt.

Instead, his vision narrowing from the sides from the pain and the heat and the heartache, Sheldon collapsed onto the floor.

* * *

The smell was so putrid he woke up coughing.

"Careful, careful," soothed a husky but soft voice.

Amy! Amy was here!

But when he opened his eyes, there was someone else there, a middle-aged man in an old-fashioned brown suit with reddish skin, a sympathetic smile on his face, as he bent over Sheldon, still on the floor.

Sheldon pulled his head back from the smell, but his head was incredibly sore. "What?" was all he managed to get out, as his throat was so dry.

"Sorry. Smelling salts," the man said, pulling them away. He had an English accent. "You gave us quite a scare. Do you know your name? Where you are?"

"Yes." Sheldon rubbed his forehead. "Dr. Sheldon Cooper. And I'm on a train. The Sunset Limited." The car swayed beneath him, but his stomach didn't recoil this time.

"Do you think you could stand?"

Sheldon nodded and the man stood first, holding out his hand to him. He didn't take it and instead gripped the edge of the bench to pull himself upright.

Only when he was standing did he notice the group of Amtrak employees assembled in the hallway, watching him carefully through the open door. The overhead light in the compartment had been turned on; it was dark outside now. "What's happening?"

"I came to scan tickets," the conductor explained, "and I saw you, passed out on the floor. Fortunately, there was a doctor right next door."

"Dr. Watson," the man said briskly, planting his hands on Sheldon's shoulders and guiding him to sit down. He didn't protest or fight, allowing himself to be led. "Do you know what happened?"

"I had a headache. A migraine, I think. Really, Dr. Watson?"

"How do you feel now?" the doctor asked, ignoring his last question, reaching for his wrist, checking his pulse.

"Tired. A little weak. Very thirsty. But better."

"Good and strong," Dr. Watson said, letting go of his wrist. "Do you get migraines often?"

"Never."

Dr. Watson frowned. "I don't like a grown man suddenly getting a migraine. And it's unusual for them to resolve like that. Perhaps you were just dehydrated, but I still recommend you get off at the first stop and see a doctor who has the resources to do a full exam. There's very little I can do with only a first aid kit."

"No, I have to stay on this train! My girlfriend is somewhere on this train."

"There are doctors in Mississippi. I'm sure your girlfriend would get off with you; surely she'd rather see you healthy than anything else," Dr. Watson said. He waved his hand toward the group of employees and someone handed him a bottle of water that he in turn held out to Sheldon.

"Mississippi?" Sheldon asked, not reaching for the bottle. "We should be in Louisiana. Or Texas at the furthest, but I doubt I was out that long."

"No, we're not going through Texas," the conductor explained. "This is the Sunset Limited traveling east."

"What? But I'm supposed to be going west, toward Los Angeles on the nine o'clock train!" Sheldon's head thumped again in time with his pulse and he put his hand up to his forehead.

"Calm down," Dr. Watson soothed, "don't get upset."

"Um, well, the westbound train leaves at nine tomorrow _morning_." Then the conductor turned to confer with the small group of employees behind him.

"I was so sick, I couldn't see properly, I wasn't thinking properly," Sheldon muttered into his palm. "The compartment was empty . . . I've never done anything so stupid in my entire life." No, that wasn't true. He didn't push Ramon away.

"It's okay." Dr. Watson sat down next to him. "We'll figure something out. I'm here with my business partner and he's extremely clever at finding one's way out of difficulties." He tipped up the bottle and encouraged Sheldon to take a cold drink.

The conductor started to speak again. "This compartment is empty for the duration of the trip, so we can transfer your ticket if you like. However, I still recommend you get off somewhere to see a doctor and then you can get back on the train traveling in the opposite direction. Or take another route."

"Thank you," Sheldon said.

Dr. Watson asked, "Is there someone we can call for you? Your girlfriend, you said?"

Sheldon shook his head and leaned the top of his body to his side, picking up the pillow and clutching it to him as he lay down. "I'm not even sure she wants to be my girlfriend anymore. And I don't blame her."

_To be continued . . ._

* * *

_**Thank you in advance for your reviews!** _


	6. Chapter 6

After locating a hotel near the train station and checking in, Amy debated about how to spend her evening. The Sunset Limited to Los Angeles did not leave until nine the next morning. Having never been to New Orleans before, she considered getting a taxi to the French Quarter, maybe stopping at the original Café Du Monde for beignets; however, a quick check of the Internet discouraged her as several people reported that the French Quarter could be unsafe for single women at night.

She decided to ask the employees at the reception desk for recommendations, and they kindly provided the name of nearby restaurant with food even better than the touristy French Quarter, including homemade beignets for dessert. Taking their advice, Amy downloaded a new book on her Kindle app to read over dinner and set off. The food was just as delicious as promised and the hot, sugary beignets were swoon-worthy.

However, she just couldn't concentrate on her book while eating. All around her in the bistro-looking space were couples eating and talking and laughing. Amy kept finding herself staring at one happy pairing or another before forcing herself to look out the window at the street instead. She had asked Sheldon not to call her or contact her until she was ready, and he was doing just that. He hadn't even replied to her text about what train she was getting on tomorrow morning. She had no idea where in his journey he was, although she knew she could pull up the Amtrak website and determine what route his train out of Charlottesville was taking.

But she regretted her request, pining every second that passed without word from him.

After closing her book and paying her bill, Amy started the walk back to her hotel. Dusk was approaching and the air was heavy with humidity. As she rounded the corner for the last block, the sound of an unknown but mournful tune wafted across the street to her. The song was so full of regret, she found herself drawn to it, as though it was a kindred spirit in musical form.

Amy spotted a narrow building that appeared lifted whole out of the French Quarter with long plantation shutters and black wrought iron scroll work on the balcony. She crossed the street, the notes calling to her as a siren. The front door was open, but then she had to step through three separate curtains of beads before she could see inside. It was dark inside, the windows apparently blacked out to give the appearance of midnight. Each small round table was lit by a crystal ball, the type a fortune teller would use, turned into an atmospheric lamp.

As her eyes adjusted to the dim, Amy realized that it must be a costume party. Thin men bobbed here and there in old fashioned suits, patterned waistcoats, and cravats tied with flourish. Then she noticed other men, larger, more powerfully built, dressed in dark tails and . . . kilts?

"Welcome to the Hidden Brotherhood!" A voice trawled at her, and she swiveled her head to see one of the fancier men approaching her. "Would you like a table?"

"The - The Hidden Brotherhood? Is this a gay bar? I mean, that's wonderful, it's just that I'm not," Amy sputtered.

"Oh, gay, straight, bicurious, it's all just a different side of the same crumpet!" The host said while he tucked her arm under his without warning and led her to a table along the edge. "I would say we don't bite here, but well, you know." He gave an exaggerated shrug.

"But I don't know . . ." Amy protested feebly as he pulled out the chair and she found herself sitting in it, a white napkin lowered over her lap with a exaggerated swirl by the host.

Then the host was gone just as the band onstage struck up another song, this one more upbeat and catchy.

"Oh, it's just too good to be true! A visitor!" Another of the thin and overdressed men approached on the opposite side, and he pulled out the other chair at the table before Amy could protest. "You simply must have our house drink. I've taken the liberty of ordering us each one."

"But I don't know you," Amy said even two tall flutes of some sort of green, fizzy liquid were placed on the table in front of them by a waiter.

"My little mutton-chop, you don't have to know someone to drink with them!" The gentleman at her table picked up his glass and took a hearty swig. He had a perfect English upper-crust accent, but Amy couldn't tell if it was real or affected. "Your turn."

"Are you trying to Rufie me?"

"Aren't you a peach! As -" his eyes traveled down her torso and back up "- well, let's say that as original as your outfit is, you're not my type, if you know what I mean." He wiggled his eyebrows. "But your shoes are divine."

A smile bubbled up out of Amy. He was so over the top and obvious, but there was something delightful about him. He was dressed as she imagined Oscar Wilde might have been in his most dandified of days. No, that wasn't quite right. He was dressed as Liberace dressed as Oscar Wilde might have been. His blonde hair was arranged in something like a Mohawk pompadour, and it was laced with pink sparkles. The style suited his pixie face perfectly. His suit was green velvet, and the waistcoat was green and pink paisley. Instead of cravat like so many others, his neck was surrounded by rows of ruffles. In the buttonhole of his lapel was a pink peony, so large it threatened to fall out at any moment.

"Amy Farrah Fowler," she said, extending her arm for a handshake.

"Three names! I adore three names!" He took her hand, rotated her wrist and leaned over to give the back of her hand an exaggerated kiss. "Lord Akeldama, at your beck and call." Something about the name struck Amy as familiar, as though she'd read it somewhere before, but she couldn't place it. "Now, you drink up. You'll insult our dear bartender if you don't at least sample his finest creation."

With not a little reservation, Amy reached for the drink that looked more like a witch's brew than a libation. But she took a sip anyway, coughing slightly as the bubbles tickled the back of her throat all the way up into her nose. "It's - It's . . ." She took another drink, this time larger and without the cough. Unable to place the exact flavors, she found it delicious anyway. "Oddly enticing."

"Something I always strive to be." Lord Akeldama smiled and reached over to clink his glass with hers. "Now, my little sugar cube, what brings you to our parlor? You won't find it on any map." He leaned closer to whisper, "Google has no idea we exist."

"I was just walking by and I heard the music. The song . . ." Amy frowned. "I don't know, it's like it perfectly encapsulated my feelings."

"And those are what, my little ball of wool?"

Amy looked away and sat her glass back on the table. She'd had more to drink than she thought; the flute was almost empty.

"Oh! I've said something indelicate! Please forgive for me for putting my satin pump in my mouth!" If he'd thrown his hand over his brow in agony, Amy would not have been surprised.

"No, it's fine. It just reminded me of something my boyfriend called me once." She picked up her glass again and downed the last of the cocktail.

"And yet you do not smile when you think of this."

"Have you ever loved someone with all your heart and then you find out someone else has kissed them?" Amy asked suddenly.

"Kissed or bitten?"

"What do you mean?"

It was Lord Akeldama's turn to look away, and, for a second, Amy thought she saw something ancient and sad in his eyes. "There was a man once . . . he had the most beautiful blue eyes . . . and his taste in fashion was divine . . . but he was bitten by another." He shrugged and turned back, his face light and effervescent again. "It was not to be. But a kiss, my dear, could be just a kiss. Was your lover party to the arrow shot from her Cupid's bow?"

Amy shook her head. "He says he wasn't. That she did it to him without his consent, that he was trapped."

"Then I suppose there are only two remaining questions. The first is: Do you believe him?"

Taking a deep breath, Amy looked back at the stage, the current song something melancholy again. A waiter brought two more flutes of the house cocktail and sat them on the table. "Yes. I do."

"Well, then, my little lemon tart, the only question left is: How are you going to kill her?"

"Kill her!" Amy almost spat out the drink she was taking.

"I have a weapon of my own devising I could lend you, a sort of scythe crossed with a gilded pipe. It also looks heavenly on a mantel when not in use."

"I'm not going to kill her! That's outrageous!"

"More's the pity. Outrageous is my specialty. But, all outrageousness aside, if you love him and you believe him, you should tell him so. Poor man, he must be in knots over it. It may still have been just a kiss, but that doesn't mean it didn't feel like a bite to him."

It wasn't that Amy hadn't considered Sheldon's mental state, it wasn't that his emotions hadn't crossed her mind. Of course she worried about him. He didn't deal well with change and he really didn't deal well with things he couldn't control. He had told her that his delay in telling her was because he was not sure how he felt about it; even when he had told her, he had used this same phrase.

Replaying their last FaceTime conversation in her mind, she remembered the way he'd looked away, how his voice had often trailed, how he let pauses fill the space between them. And, then, at the end . . . It had been like when she broke up with him, that horrible summer that always filled her with so much painful regret she tried her best to forget that it ever happened.

She told him not to call her, not to speak to her, and he agreed. His face strong but his eyes pleading, his voice racked with confusion and pain.

"I think I've made a mistake," Amy said to her companion.

"Then chances are you have," Akeldama said softly. "Can you undo it?"

"I don't know," she confessed. "I - A couple of years ago, I made one, too, and he took it the same way, and . . . and . . . that may have been my only chance." Amy swallowed away some tears.

"My poor dear," Akeldama said, taking her hand in his own, "I have, well, not really lived exactly, but I've been around for many, many years. If you love him and he loves you, can it be as bad as all that?"

"Maybe not," Amy said with a sad smile.

The music picked up with a burst, a jumpy song. "Oh, look! If this won't cheer you up, nothing will! Our canine friends are going to put on a show for us." Amy looked at the stage to see a group of of the kilt-clad men, the especially strapping ones, linking arms.

"Are they going to do the can-can?" she asked, incredulous.

"The best part is that werewolves don't wear anything underneath!"

She burst out laughing. It was all so ridiculous: this bar, the man sitting with her, and especially the things he was saying. She had the feeling that this was all sort of game or at least a costume party and that Lord Akeldama was playing a role. And what kind of name was Lord Akeldama anyway?

"Tell me about this place. What it is, exactly? Why is it so secretive? And why the costumes and personas?"

"We gather here because there was a time, on another continent, where we could live freely, not just the shadows."

"You make sound like you're actual vampires and werewolves, not just homosexual," Amy pointed out. "Oh! I'm sorry. These drinks are too strong for me."

"Let's have some bracing tea, then, instead," Lord Akeldama waved his hand in the air as though that was enough, and Amy believed that it would be. "And it takes far more to offend me, my little pudding cup. Generally an egregious fashion choice."

"But the darkness? And the references to biting?" Amy asked. "It sounds like a fanfiction."

Akeldama tilted his head. "What's wrong with a little fanfiction, my little fuzzy rose?" He leaned over, whispering in her ear. "I just read the most delicious fanfiction about Darcy and Bingley. It's thirty-three chapters of aching staring and, then, in the last chapter, there's the most explicit scene when Darcy puts his - Oh! Look! Here's the tea!"

* * *

It was midday when the train stopped in Orlando, its final destination. Physically, Sheldon felt much better, although he could have done without with all the clucking over him by Dr. Watson. But at least Dr. Watson hadn't pressed him on the issue of his girlfriend. Having no other choice, Sheldon disembarked and went into the station to buy a ticket for the opposite direction. Was he one or two days behind Amy now? She hadn't texted him again, so he presumed she'd caught her train to Los Angeles that morning as planned.

"What do you mean I can't get a ticket back?" Sheldon exploded when he was given the news at the ticket desk.

"The Sunset Limited is suspending service between Orlando and New Orleans next week. Every ticket has been sold out for months, probably by train enthusiasts who want to take the last train all the way across the country. The only reason your incoming train had anything left was the sudden cancellation of a sleeping compartment."

"But the only other train out of Orlando is the Silver Meteor northbound to New York. I need to get to L.A.!"

"I'm sure that you can get a flight there. Otherwise, you'll have to go north. Or south to Miami, but I gather that's not what you want."

Sheldon rubbed his head. Maybe it was time to consider taking a flight. He had flown before and he could do it again. It was clearly the fastest and most direct route home. He would probably even beat Amy. But he didn't want to be alone in Los Angeles again. The whole reason he left it all behind was so that he didn't have to be there, hiding from and avoiding Ramona. Hiding from and avoiding what had happened.

"If I get off in Washington, D.C, I can take the Capital Limited to Chicago, correct? And then catch a train to L.A. there, the Southwest Chief probably?"

"Yes." The clerk typed some things into her computer. "I can make your reservation for the whole journey."

"Very well," Sheldon said, reaching for his wallet.

* * *

Having three and half hours to kill, Sheldon carried his backpack to a local laundry mat and washed and dried his meager assortment of clothes. It crossed his mind to buy some more but washing them was cheaper. Plus, the familiar smells of detergent and the act of carefully folding his fresh clothes helped to calm his nerves. After everything was packed away again, he walked around downtown Orlando. There wasn't enough time for Disney World, of course, but as he strolled along, he saw the familiar symbols of mouse and castle down the street and he made his way in that direction.

There was some kind of small Disney fair taking place in a park, with music and cotton candy and various other amusements. Turning away from the cluster of sugar-laden children watching a magic show, Sheldon ducked into the large white tent which was filled with temporary walls of artwork. It was cooler in there, too, away from the midday sun, and Sheldon didn't want to risk a repeat of his heat-induced migraine episode of the day before.

He walked along the walls slowly, looking at the artwork and reading the captions. It was all artwork based on and inspired by the new live-action version of _Beauty and the Beast_. It only made Sheldon miss Amy more. She had loved the movie, eagerly counting off the days until it opened, purchasing tickets in advance, asking Sheldon to wait in line with her to obtain the very best seat, holding his hand and sighing with glee throughout. He had not been so eager to see it, but he had to admit it was a wonderful memory for him; few things were better than watching Amy boil over with joy.

The memory settled heavy into his chest and when it became painful, Sheldon stepped away from the artwork to take a seat on a bench, pulling out the bottle of water he'd brought. He was sipping it and staring forward, when a swirl of yellow caught the corner of his eye and he turned to see Belle in her ballgown sit down next to him. He hadn't noticed her before; she must have been performing outside for the children and had come inside to get away from the sun just as he had.

"Hello," Sheldon said, realizing he was staring.

"Bonjour," she nodded.

Sheldon had read somewhere that Disney costumed characters were not allowed to break character while in their costumes. He wondered what Amy would ask Belle if she could. What she was reading? What she was going to do in the castle all day? Would the Beast give her a laboratory to study science if she asked?

"Would the Beast give you a laboratory to study science if you asked?"

Belle's eyebrows went up but she recovered quickly, smiling back at him. "I'm sure he'd be willing to discuss it. But I'd be happiest wherever the Beast is."

"Well done," Sheldon answered. "Non-committal answer in case a future sequel contradicts you and it brings the listener back to the central romance."

The smile on Belle's face changed, becoming more sincere as crinkles appeared at the outside corners of her eyes. Sheldon suspected this was the actor's true smile, whereas previously it had been part of her act.

"Are you visiting our little village?" she asked, pointing at his full backpack.

"Yes. I'm traveling via train to Los Angeles. It's proving to be a very circuitous route."

"Oh! I love to travel! Have you ever been to Paris?" Belle asked.

"Many years ago, when I was teaching in Germany, I went there for the weekend to appease my mother."

"It's such a romantic city!" Belle enthused, clasping her hands together in front of her and leaning toward them. She was back in character. "Everyone should go with someone they love."

"Well, that may be problem," Sheldon admitted, looking away to recap his water and put the bottle away.

"Oh, there are no problems that cannot be surmounted with patience and effort."

"Not necessarily. To put in your terms, my girlfriend has seen the beast in me and now she's not speaking to me."

"It has been my experience that seeing the beast in someone is a simple thing. Seeing the prince behind that, that is the difficult part." Sheldon's head snapped up and he looked over at Belle, her face more serious than it had yet been. "If she has already seen the prince in you, you just have to remind her of that."

"But she's going to arrive in Los Angeles first," Sheldon explained. "Ramona, um, I mean, Gaston is waiting there."

"Gaston is not important to the story, in the end. Do not give him more power than he truly has. He is merely a catalyst. If she already loves the prince in you, beastly mistakes and all, Gaston cannot change that." Sheldon was impressed with how clever she was in choosing her words. Still not breaking character, but managing to talk about someone else with the same words.

"Thank you," he whispered instead. She nodded again. Then, standing, "May I take of video of you saying hello to Amy, to show her when we are reunited?"

* * *

Back on the train, Sheldon was half-way through the dream with blonde Ursula again, although this time he had a staff and he was managing to beat her away to the melody of the _Little House on the Prairie_ theme song. Another part of his brain was saying to him, _What an odd choice of musical accompaniment. But it seems to be working!_ And then a third part of his brain chimed in with _It's Amy! It's her ring tone, that's why it's working._

"It's Amy!" he said aloud with a gasp, panting heavily from the effort in his dream combined with the fright of waking so suddenly. "It's her ring tone!"

Scrambling in the dark somewhere in the Carolinas, Sheldon managed to find his phone and accept the call just before it went to voicemail. "Amy!"

"Oh, Sheldon, I'm so glad you answered!" Without even taking a breath, her voice rambled on, "I know it's late and I know that you're probably asleep but I've made a huge mistake and now the most horrible thing has happened!"

_To be continued . . ._

* * *

_**If you enjoyed the character of Lord Akeldama, then you need to thank Gail Carriger. He is one of the most delightful characters in her uproariously funny and entertaining novels. I recommend starting with** _ **Soulless** _**, her first work.** _

_**Don't hate me! ;-) Thank you for your reviews.** _


	7. Chapter 7

"What? What's happened?" Sheldon was fully awake now, gripping his phone tightly, and he swung his bare legs over the edge of the bunk in his sleeping compartment. There hadn't been any pajamas at the Dollar General all the way back in Galesburg and he hadn't put the effort into finding any since. If sleeping almost naked, save for his underpants, was the penance he must pay for everything he'd done, then so be it.

"I'm almost certain I'm on the wrong train!"

"Why do you think that?"

"I had a ticket for the Sunset Limited from New Orleans to Los Angeles, like I told you. But I fell asleep in the observation car yesterday evening, and when I just now woke up to go back to my room, it's gone." Sheldon thought he heard her voice break a little bit, and that frightened him more than anything. Amy was a strong woman and he'd never seen or heard her be hysterical over anything. Angry, yes, sad, yes, but never truly frightened.

"What do you mean by 'it's gone'?" he asked.

"I mean I got up to walk back to my car and there's nothing behind the observation car. There's not a train back there! All I could see was night sky and the door was locked. The rest of the train is gone!" Again the break in her voice. "This is all my fault. If I'd never drank that absinthe . . ."

"What!?"

Now it really did sound like Amy was going to cry. "I don't really know, it all started last night. I went to this bar in New Orleans, it was gay costume bar or something and I had this green cocktail that was their specialty and there were vampires dressed like fops and werewolves doing the cancan and it all had to be dream or something because the next thing I knew I woke up this morning in my hotel room, just like I'd left it except there were these Mardi Gras beads on my nightstand and I don't know how they got there and this whole trip has been so strange and - I think I'm losing my mind! I spoke with the ghost of Sacajawea and Elvis gave me some shoes -"

"Calm down. Calm down," Sheldon said softly into the phone. "It's been a very strange trip for me, too." He paused, debating about telling her how various park interpreters felt the need to have personal conversations with him and how he met a doctor that really was named Dr. Watson and the Belgium in the dining car, but he didn't. "I don't think you're losing your mind. You just woke up in the middle of the night in a strange place. Remember when we first moved across the hall I kept waking up thinking that Penny had kidnapped me to write all her community college papers for her?"

"Yes." Amy said, her voice shuttering. Perhaps she really had been crying.

"There is a logical explanation for all of this. There has to be. We just have to apply our combined superior mental acuity to it. Do you know where you are, exactly?"

"We just had a stop and it looked like the sign at the station said San Marcos, Texas. But it was a really tiny station and it was dark."

Sheldon rubbed his face and let out a sigh of relief. "You're on the Texas Eagle. You're headed to Chicago."

"Chicago! Again? But - but I know I got the Sunset Limited, they scanned my ticket and everything!" Amy protested.

"The Sunset Limited breaks into two trains in San Antonio. Half goes on to Los Angeles and the over half starts to head north instead," Sheldon explained. "You said you fell asleep in the observation car, that you weren't in your assigned compartment?"

"Yesss," Amy wailed. "I don't know. I just still felt strange and I couldn't sleep in my room, so I decided to come up here to read. But that was hours ago, the sun was still up and there were other people around. I must have fallen asleep."

"It's fine. You're safe, correct? We just have to approach this practically," Sheldon reassured her.

"But I feel like such an idiot! Who doesn't realize their train splits in half and they need to stay in their assigned cabin overnight? I should have known that! Surely it was announced or on my ticket or something!"

"You said you were tired and didn't feel well. Everyone, even _homo novi_ like us, can make mistakes in those types of situations. Remember when I lost my notebook at the cowboy bar and didn't even remember it?" Amy made a small noise of agreement on the other end of the phone. "And I should tell you that something similar happened to me . . ."

Sheldon recounted the details of his heat and dehydration-induced migraine to her and how that resulted in him getting on the wrong train. He told her about the end of line in Orlando and how his only option was to head north, the opposite direction from where he wanted to go, too. Still concerned that it made him sound crazy, though, he left Dr. Watson and Belle out of his narrative.

"You're going to Chicago, too?" Amy asked and, for the first time in this conversation, she sounded hopeful.

"Yes, but -" he did a quick calculation in his head, "you'll get there a whole day before me."

"I think we should make a definitive plan of where to meet and when. And _not_ on a moving train. Somewhere solid and permanent," Amy said.

Smiling at her renewed take-charge attitude and practicality, Sheldon said suddenly, "I love you, Amy."

It came out of his mouth as it so often popped in his mind, without forethought or computation or a filter. It was the truth, perhaps the most honest thing he'd ever known or felt, and it was more solid and permanent to him than gravity. Then, his mind catching up with his heart, he added, softly, "I'm so sorry. All of this is my fault. I'm sorry about Ramona and this misguided idea to travel by train to see you and that I lied to you so that you felt you had to travel that way, too. And now we keep missing each other and -"

"I love you, too," Amy interrupted him. "I'm sorry I didn't let you talk to me earlier, that I asked you not to call me. I don't just love you, Sheldon, I trust you. And I believe you when you say there is nothing between you and Dr. Nowitzki, that it was all her doing. As for this train trip, well . . . I'm finally getting to see a lot of the country I haven't seen before."

An idea struck Sheldon like the migraine had. "Amy? Let's not meet in Chicago. Let's do what you suggested; I want to see you in California. It's where we met, it's where we live together, it's where I've loved you the most." He thought of the ring box still safely snuggled in his pants pocket; several times a day, he put his hand inside to feel that it was still there, that it was safe. "I want to meet you somewhere that means something to us."

Amy breathed out deeply on the phone. "Okay. What do you propose?"

 _For as long as we both shall live_ , Sheldon thought. But, instead, he replied, "When you get to Chicago, take the Empire Builder to Seattle and then the Coast Starlight to L.A. They're two of the most beautiful routes and you'll get to see more of the country. Relax and enjoy yourself; this has been too stressful for both of us. I'll follow you, and we'll meet . . ." he licked his lips, "at our apartment. I've never been happier than there with you."

"Me, too. I'd like that very much."

Sheldon leaned his head back against the bench. Amy hadn't caught that he'd lied again, probably because he wrapped it such a profound truth. And this little white lie would be forgiven, he knew. He had another plan. But first, those days without clean underpants haunting him, he asked Amy about the location of her luggage.

* * *

It was sunset in eastern Minnesota, and Amy watched the mighty and muddy Mississippi river flow past the window of her sleeping compartment on the Empire Builder. It was late and her car attendant had already converted the bench into the bed for the night. Amy sat in the corner of the bed, hugging a pillow, and tucking her feet up under her Sleeping Beauty flannel nightgown. It wouldn't have been her first choice, but she'd been so grateful to see it when she opened the box.

When she boarded the City of New Orleans a couple of days ago (Only a couple of days? It felt like weeks), a fellow rider had seen her struggling with her big suitcase in her tiny compartment and had shared the idea of buying a smaller tote bag in which to place just the necessities for just the number of nights on the train. Then her large suitcase could be checked for each leg of the journey. After the heart-breaking miss on the platform in Indianapolis, in which Amy was convinced she would have caught Sheldon with just a few more minutes to spare that she had instead wasted on wresting the suitcase, she'd taken this suggestion. It was this tote bag she'd carried with her to observation car, so at least she had her purse and her phone charger and a single change of clothes when she'd accidentally split from her suitcase back in Texas.

In Chicago, there had only been about a half-hour to change trains, but she'd heard her name over the public address system to report to the postal desk in the station. Initially confused and concerned, her mood immediately changed when an Amazon box was passed to her. Amy didn't even know it was possible to have a shipment sent to the train station or that they would hold it for a passenger.

Because of the short layover, she had to wait to open it in her sleeping compartment. Not only was there a Sleeping Beauty nightgown, but there were several pairs of her favorite cotton underwear, a new bra in exactly the right size, two tee shirts, several pairs of tights, an extra phone charging cord, and a paperback copy of _Strangers on a Train_.

"You sent this," was the first thing Amy said when Sheldon answered his FaceTime call, aiming the camera at the box, not herself. "No one else would know all my sizes."

"What's the point of paying for Prime if you don't use to its full capacity?" Sheldon answered. "Besides, I knew your layover in Chicago wasn't long enough to do any shopping."

They'd talked for a couple of hours, then, Sheldon on the Capitol Limited heading toward Chicago, Amy pulling away from it. The conversation wasn't about Romana Nowitzki or the trial and tribulations of their journeys so far, it was about them and the things they loved, about their joint and individual science projects and their favorite television shows and all the topics that made their relationship what it was. They'd only hung up because the dinner hour arrived on their respective routes.

Later, after dinner, Amy had called Sheldon again, their Goodnight Call, and, for the first time in this bizarre journey, there had been only excitement and eagerness in her heart. Once again, they had an enjoyable conversation. Sheldon shared a variety of fun facts about first Wisconsin and then Minnesota when her train crossed the border.

Now, sighing, Amy leaned her head against the window. It was almost dark but the river caught the last rays of the sun and reflected them back up, a glowing ribbon of light upon the landscape. It had started to rain, gently, and a few droplets hit the glass and danced slowly in a zigged path down the window pane. The two conversations today made her ache for Sheldon in a different way than she had earlier in this journey. They made her ache for him in the way she did in New Jersey, talking to him there. The way she ached for him even before that, in their apartment, catching a glance of his naked backside when he got dressed in the morning and she tried not to let her gaze linger too long.

What was that song, the one from the musical _Big River_?

 _River in the rain_  
_Sometimes at night you look like a long white train_  
_Winding your way somewhere  
_ _River I love you don't you care_

 _If you're on the run winding some place_  
_Just trying to find the sun_  
_Whether the sunshine, whether the rain  
_ _River I love you just the same_

Sheldon looked like that at night, in the dim light of their bedroom, the times he'd opened himself to her, his long and lean body a glowing ribbon upon the landscape of their bed. There had been times it was hesitant and gentle, like the softest tides washing over her, and there had been times it was roaring and wild, a flood of passion. But there had always been Sheldon, his pale body looking like a long white train, winding his way to her, and Amy truly believed they found sunshine in the inlet there.

* * *

They would go through Pittsburgh soon, and Sheldon knew that meant it was far past his bedtime. Pittsburgh, city of bridges, and he could see the Allegheny River out his window, even the dark. It glowed paler than the landscape around it, cutting through the last of the farmland before the suburbs arrived.

He missed Amy. He always missed Amy, but so many other confusing and conflicting emotions had distracted him the past few days that missing her, just missing her, had been pushed behind fear of hurting her, fear of losing her, fear of never being good enough for her. But now he knew that he was forgiven for hiding the truth from her, for being so short-sighted about the trap being laid in front of him in the first place, for not heeding Penny's warning.

Thinking of Amy, in her nightgown, on a train made him smile wistfully. He always wanted to take a train journey with Amy. And, in a sense, he was. No, he wasn't in the same compartment as her, sleeping in their bunk beds to the sway of the same train, but they were having similar experiences. Sheldon hadn't told her, but one could track the real-time status of a train on Amtrak's website and he was tracking the path of the Empire Builder across the northern edge of the country. Although he was pausing for the night, he was going to text her - or tell her, if they were on the phone - interesting data points about the areas through which she was traveling. It was the closest he could get to being there with her.

The bench had been turned into a bed a few hours ago, and Sheldon reached for the pillow he'd tossed aside and hugged it to his chest. It may have been the closest he could get to traveling to Amy, but it wasn't close enough. He had an ache for her, like the one he'd had before she left for New Jersey. The one he'd had far more times than he admitted and that he struggled to deal with.

The truth was he enjoyed being intimate with Amy, very much so. More than he ever thought was possible. But it was overwhelming, such a rush of sensations and emotions that he struggled to categorize it all for days afterwards. He remembered the first time, how his heart hammered in his chest as he tried to be gentle, as he tried to prolong the proceedings, wanting it to be perfect for Amy. And, then, other times, when it wasn't like that at all, when he let it overtake him, a rush of wild and unrestrained actions and words, jumbling and tumbling over each other, mixing and knotting, a chaos of pleasure.

And through it all was knotted Amy. He thought of her body in the dark night, spectral and creamy, curving like the rivers through Pittsburgh now, darting one way and then another, meeting each other, pulling away, joining and traveling together.

What was that sappy song Amy had on her iTunes?

 _Lonely rivers flow_  
_To the sea, to the sea_  
_To the open arms of the sea_  
_Lonely rivers sigh_  
_"Wait for me, wait for me"  
_ _I'll be coming home, wait for me_

He was flowing toward her now, meeting her at the sea, although she didn't quite know it yet. He was going to find her by the sea, the sunset out the window bathing her face in golden light, and he was going to flow into her, he was going to ask her allow him to rest, to stop searching, to let her open arms encircle him forever.

* * *

Amy had never been so happy to see a train in her life as when she walked out to the wedding-cake confectionary of Seattle's King Street Station to the Coast Starlight. Only one more night and she'd be home. Then only one more night to sleep alone, although in her own bed, and then Sheldon would be home. They could finally talk, face to face, and they'd be able to put all this behind them.

Not that she hadn't enjoyed the past three days. Sheldon had been correct; once she relaxed and their relationship got back on the track, the train trip had been very enjoyable. The scenery was breathtaking, the sky in Montana stretching as far as the eye could see, the mountains of Glacier National Park soaring above her. All the while, she received texts from Sheldon, perfectly timed with details and antidotes about what she was passing. Even her strange dreams had subsided; Sheldon wasn't drowning anymore, and she had slept well.

She couldn't wait to get the photograph she'd had taken of herself framed for him. With a couple of hours of layover in Seattle, she'd decided to visit the Space Needle and the Museum of Pop Culture, the latter because it reminded her of Sheldon. Yes, she was disappointed he couldn't be there with her, especially because it was clear he would adore that museum, but she'd asked some kindly strangers to take her picture in Captain Kirk's command chair as she tried her best to imitate William Shatner's over-acting face. The result was exactly what she wanted, and she thought it would make the perfect gift for Sheldon, a way to thank him for suggesting and then making these last two legs of her journey a relaxing vacation instead of the stressful struggle it had started as.

Settling into her last sleeping compartment, Amy sighed happily. Tomorrow morning, she'd wake up in California and lunch shortly after the stop in Sacramento. They'd be back in Los Angeles around midnight. The last leg of the journey. Thirty-five hours that were a known quantity on the what many considered the most scenic route in the entire country. She knew exactly what to expect, and nothing could - or would - surprise her now.

* * *

Sheldon lifted the bag containing his new purchase high, so that it obscured his face as he stepped out of the underground tunnel from the Sacramento Valley Station to the train platform. He'd purchased a coach seat this time, on purpose, both because he knew coach boarded at a different platform than first class here in Sacramento and because he doubted it would matter. However, it didn't hurt to be too careful; one quick glance of him would ruin everything now. After all, Amy thought he was somewhere in Kansas on the Southwest Chief once again but heading west instead of east this time.

But he never had been. Instead, he'd rode the Zephyr over the Rockies, through the canyons and along another river, the Colorado this time, to find his way to her.

His hair ruffled as the train whooshed past him, the airing screeching with the sound of it grinding to a halt in front of him. Only after all the cars had been counted, did he risk lowering the garment bag until a full stop was reached and an attendant opened the door to the coach in front of him. Stepping forward, Sheldon folded the bag over his arm, his backpack over his shoulders.

The attendant smiled at him as he climbed the stairs. "Welcome aboard the Coast Starlight to Los Angeles, sir."

_To be continued . . ._

* * *

_**Will Sheldon's plan prove successful? Find out in the next chapter!** _

_**Thank you for your reviews!** _


	8. Chapter 8

After glancing over the top of the page, Amy closed her book and set it on the bench next to her. The sky was starting to shade orange and pink near the horizon as the sun inched closer to touching the edge where the sky met the ocean. She felt she owed it to Mother Nature to give this sunset over the Pacific Ocean her full attention. It was her last evening on the train, and this was, by most accounts, what made this train route so special as they traveled south along the coast. She'd reserved and eaten at the earliest time so that she could devote herself to the task of observation.

Tilting her head, she considered going to the observation car, but she thought she would prefer the silence of her private compartment over the clicking of fancy cameras and the dull hum of conversation.

She thought of Sheldon out there in Utah or wherever his train was at the moment and she wished she could share this sunset with him. They'd only been on a train journey once before, and that had started poorly and ended in heaven, with his lips pressing against hers, first firmly and then relaxing into a soft kiss as his hands reached for her waist . . .

The memory broke into a smile and a longing sigh. Someday, maybe, they'd make another journey together. Someday, maybe, she'd get to share this sunset with Sheldon. And, then, just when the last inch of the sun slipped beyond the Earth, they would turn to each other and there would another kiss, something beautiful and endless.

Amy shifted in her seat. It was a different ache than in Minnesota. It was not the ache of her loins, it was the ache of heart. She loved Sheldon Cooper and it was a sublimely raw emotion, leaving her heart exposed like that for him.

"Would passenger Amy Farrah Fowler please report to the Pacific Parlour?"

Startled in her seat, Amy furrowed her brows. What? Had she heard that correctly? On cue, the announcement was repeated. Perhaps it was the unexpected nature of the call, but only the worst fears flashed through Amy's mind. Why did she need to report anywhere? For anything? And why the Pacific Parlour? Why couldn't the conductor or whoever needed to talk to her come to her compartment?

Concerned and not a little peeved to be pulled from her seat in the midst of the show out her window, Amy grabbed her purse and walked toward the historic restored lounge car.

* * *

With a large gulp, Sheldon smoothed his brand new tie one more time as the repeat announcement went over the public address system. He prayed to a god he did not believe in that no one would walk through here on their way to or from the observation car while he was here. All the conductor had agreed to was to make the announcement for him; Sheldon had been unable to convince him to completely block access to the car for half an hour.

The last time he'd been on a train along the coast of California with Amy, he hadn't been nervous at all. Rather he'd been enjoying himself and then not enjoying himself and then there were her lips and he'd never enjoyed himself more. A part of him wished it could be like that again, sudden and unplanned but a perfect drop of serendipity in his life.

His foot tapped, counting out the seconds, calculating how long it would take Amy to walk here from her compartment. In his mind he could see her, just as she appeared on their FaceTime call earlier today, her burgundy cardigan over the plain blue tee shirt he'd sent to her, the familiar fall of brown hair, the way she'd put her hands out, her fingertips skimming the edge of the rooms as she walked by to help steady her against the movement of the train. She'd bring her purse, not just because it was in her nature to be prepared but because of the loss of luggage back in Texas. Her brow would be furrowed, her jaw set in determination even as confusion tugged at the edge of her eyes.

He considered one last time what to say. He'd debated for days how to start, whether to deflect or answer the questions she'd doubtlessly volley at him about his presence there. Of serious of consideration was wether or not to bring up what had brought him to this moment, but, in the end, he'd decided against it. Sheldon didn't want the moment sullied by the missteps and bizarre happenings of this journey, and he most definitely didn't want to mention _her_ name, to allow _her_ even a nanosecond of time in what should be Amy's moment, their moment, only.

The sunset was perfect now, his timing impeccable. The entire visible heaven was bathed in purples and golds, a half-circle of glowing light reflecting off the ocean beneath it. The light danced around the Pacific Parlour car, catching and gleaming off the restored mahogany wood, deepening the shadows of the dark purple velvet chairs. Above them, the flat ceiling was pierced by thousands of tiny dots to allow the LED light to shine; soon, it would be like standing beneath a tent of stars, the famous starlight for which the train was named.

One _click-swoosh_ , the sound of the door of car opening. He saw her in the vestibule between the cars before she registered him. The furrow, the jaw, the eyes.

Then, over the second _click-swoosh_ , her eyes widened and her mouth opened into a perfect O as Amy stepped into the starlight he'd created along the ocean for her.

"Sheldon?" she asked as she walked toward him, and he saw her eyes take in his brand new suit, the one he'd bought this morning in Sacramento.

He knew then exactly how he wanted to do it. No preamble was necessary with Amy. Amy, who knew him better than anyone else, who had seen and dissected his little gray cells, who loved both the beast and the prince. There was only one thing he wanted to say to her, only one that mattered. Everything else was just semantics.

"Amy." Reaching into his pocket, Sheldon got down on one knee, right next to her blue suede shoes, in the middle of the historic lounge car, the golden light of the sunset bathing them both here along the California coast, where the water met the land, somewhere that meant something to them.

Sheldon looked up into Amy's face as her chest expanded from the deep breath she took, and he said, opening the box, with more confidence and surety than he'd ever felt in his life, "Will you marry me?"

Amy's mouth opened as though it was in slow motion, and Sheldon was certain his heart completely stopped beating and his breathing halted and there was only the sound of the wheels on the tracks as he waited for her answer to rise out of her throat and

"Sir! Sir!"

Sheldon jumped, the bottom of his stomach falling away from him as he looked at the face in front of him. "Your seat back needs to be upright for landing," came her muffled voice.

"But . . ."

Looking around him, Sheldon blinked several times, taking in the sight of the half-empty airplane, rows upon rows of tall blue seats, no clickety-clack of rails, just that consent hum and rustle of stale air.

"Sir? You need to put your seat back up."

Oh! Her voice was muffled because he still had his earbuds in; he must have fallen asleep watching his cartoons. Pulling them out angrily, Sheldon looked around, a few passengers that were watching him darting their eyes away.

"Where am I?" he asked.

"We're about to land in New Jersey. Are you alright, sir?" the flight attendant asked. "You were asleep for quite a while."

"I had a dream . . . and . . ." Sheldon reached up to touch his head, although he allowed the flight attendant to reach over and press the button to raise his seat back. "We were on a train, well not the same train, different trains, and we kept making mistakes that persons of our level of intelligence would never make and Carman SanDiego was there and Elvis was there and Thomas Jefferson was there . . . oh! it was Hercule Poirot, by Agatha Christie! And that vampire from that book Amy made me read, Lord somebody."

"It sounds very vivid." She smiled down at him and moved on. No doubt, to her, he was just another sleep-dazed passenger on this late cross-country flight to New Jersey.

"It was."

Sheldon slumped in his seat as the pilot come on the speaker to tell the flight crew to prepare for landing. He could feel the descent in his ears. He brushed his hand against his pants pocket, making sure the ring box was still there. If he shut his eyes, he could see still it all: the rich light of the sunset bouncing off Amy's hair, the warmth of the wood around them, even the strange blue oxford shoes she was wearing. It was as strong as a memory to him, not a dream, and he could see the pooling of happy tears in her eyes and the edge of her lips turning up and even the way the very point of her tongue depressed in her mouth as she started to form the first sound of her answer.

Amy was going to say yes.

Amy was going to say yes. Sheldon smiled. Yes! That was it, that was entire point, wasn't it? All he needed was for Amy to say yes.

In the taxi, at the airport, during the first half of the flight, before he fell asleep, his mind had churned and churned in time with his stomach, first considering one possibility and then another. Should he call when he got to the airport in New Jersey to give her a warning? Should he start with idle chit-chat or the more important fact that he missed her? Or should he make up an excuse for coming without notice? No, of course not. Should he, instead, start by telling her they needed to talk? But that phrase had a bad connotation. Or should he just blurt it out, even as he stood in her door way, ripping off his crime like a Band-Aid? It seemed cruel, though, to start the conversation that way. What if she was shocked? Angry? Amy would probably be angry.

But he'd already seen the result of those actions. There, between Sacajawea and Dr. Watson and Belle and the over-sharing with strangers and the stupid mistakes both he and Amy were much too intelligent to make if it had all been real, he'd already tried all that. He tried lying, he tried avoiding it, he tried trying telling her that he needed time to think about it first, he tried just blurting it out. None of those were the correct solution, none of those had the desired reaction from her.

Only one moment of his dream was leading to the ideal conclusion of this sordid affair. That moment in the Coast Starlight's Pacific Parlour.

Why would he bury the lead? If he started with any of those things, it would only confuse and distract Amy. Not that they didn't need to be discussed - he'd never hide the truth from her, he'd never lie to her - but to mention _that woman_ first was to give her too much importance. She wasn't important, she never had been. She was just a mistake and an evil person; the sooner she was dealt with and put behind them, the better.

No, the most important thing in the whole universe was for Amy to know he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. And she would say yes.

The wheels hit the tarmac and the plane slowed with a noisy gush of air on the runway. As it turned and start to taxi to the gate, Sheldon smiled and reached down to touch the ring again. He knew exactly what he would do. Just like with Amy herself, there was no doubt, no fear. He wouldn't call her from the airport. He'd surprise her. He was sure Amy would think it romantic for him to show up unannounced and propose on bended knee. He briefly thought of buying some flowers for her in the airport, but all Amy had ever wanted was him and that's all he needed to offer her. Himself and the ring.

She'd open that door and he would already be down on one knee, waiting for her, asking her what he should have asked years ago.

Amy was going to say yes. He just knew it.

THE END

* * *

_**From the moment I saw Sheldon's face at the end of the Season 10 finale, I was struck by his determination and confidence as he proposed to Amy. He looked, to me, like a man that had considered all his options thoroughly and knew exactly what he was doing, why he was doing it, and what Amy's answer would be (at least, I hope so!). How did he find all those answers on that flight to New Jersey? Here is my somewhat farcical answer.** _

_**(By the way, didn't anyone pick up on the huge clue in Chapter 2?)** _

_**Just a reminder, this is SPOILER FREE STORY (this is all conjecture, it was completed well before Season 11 taping started, nothing that may or may not be in the taping report is included here, etc.) and please, please DO NOT INCLUDE SPOILERS in your reviews. Thank you very much.** _

_**Once again, this story would not have been possible without the proofreading and idea-bouncing skills of my beta, Melissa. Honestly, she's part psychologist now. I sent her a half-completed story at one point and told her that I didn't think I could finish it or that it was worthy of being finished. It was she who insisted I at least try.** _

_**And, as always my dear readers, thank you for all your (spoiler free!) reviews!** _


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